Congress slams government for hike in cooking gas price

New Delhi, Aug 2 (IANS) The Congress on Wednesday slammed the hike in the prices of subsidized cooking gas, petrol and diesel, saying the Modi government's "anti-people face" has been unmasked.

"Principal objective of democracy and welfare state is the duty towards the last man in the line. The BJP government is, however, burdening the common man for enriching a handful of its crony friends," said Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala.

"The Central government has unleashed a three-pronged economic attack on the livelihood of over 60 crore Indians. Truth is that the Prime Minister and the BJP are breaking the ordinary people's back by overburdening them with a slew of unprecedented taxes."

He said the current "triple whammy" by the Modi government had jeopardized the budget of every household.

"By a 'tughlaki farmaan' of the Modi government, it has been decided to increase the price of every gas cylinder by Rs 4 every month starting from July 2017 up to March 2018."

The party also slammed the State Bank of India decision to slash interest on savings account deposits from 4 per cent to 3.5 per cent.

"Savings accounts in SBI are currently estimated at 37 crore with a deposit of 9.4 lakh crore. If there is a reduction of 0.5 per cent in interest rate, there is a direct loss of Rs 4,700 crore annually to the account holders," said Surjewala.

The Congress also hit out at the government for increasing the dealer commission on petrol by Rs 1 per litre and on diesel by 72 paise per litre from August 1.

"Cost of this would be borne by the ordinary consumer and it will cost an additional Rs 12,000 crore. Truth is the government is earning an annual revenue of Rs 2,33,000 crore by imposing tax and import duty on petrol-diesel," said Surjewala.