No, PM Modi: Here's why I won't be giving up my LPG subsidy
Clever ploy: If you can’t convince them politically, blackmail them emotionally. Put the burden of subsidy on their conscience while you munch your chickens for Rs 29 in the Parliament’s canteen.
The current price of petrol should be Rs 30 per litre, diesel should be Rs 21 per litre and LPG cylinder for Rs 250. But the NDA government has been openly looting the public by imposing various taxes and deliberately keeping the prices higher. Under these circumstances, what right does Mr Modi have to ask people to give up subsidies voluntarily?
To insinuate that not giving up LPG ‘subsidy’ is tantamount to not contributing to nation-building, leeching off government dole is a white lie. Most of the people who Modi expects to buy expensive cylinders are already paying huge chunks of their income to the government, for cross-subsidising many of its social schemes.
Most of us pay 10 to 33 per cent of our salary as income tax, whose slabs finance minister Arun Jaitley did not bother changing even after berating the UPA for being unkind to the middle class. In addition, there are several other taxes—VAT, service tax, toll tax, house tax, municipality tax, garbage collection tax, cess for education, cess for Swacch Bharat, clean Ganga, fuel surcharge…the list is long. (A back-of-the-hand calculation would reveal that a person in the highest-tax bracket ends up paying nearly half of his income to the government.)
The government has almost withdrawn from school education, leaving the field open for the private players who overcharge us (another form of tax due to government incompetence). The government’s healthcare system has collapsed, where, again, private players are thriving. There is no form of social security for the old, handicapped, ill and the unemployed. The government doesn’t spend enough on keeping roads and streets safe for its citizens; it ignores the environment and does nothing to check pollution of air, water and other resources.
No, Prime Minister, we are already doing our best for nation-building. It is time the government repaid some of our generosity instead of asking for more charity through emotional atyachar.
You manage your finances, and let us deal with our kitchen and conscience.
Clever ploy: If you can’t convince them politically, blackmail them emotionally. Put the burden of subsidy on their conscience while you munch your chickens for Rs 29 in the Parliament’s canteen.
The current price of petrol should be Rs 30 per litre, diesel should be Rs 21 per litre and LPG cylinder for Rs 250. But the NDA government has been openly looting the public by imposing various taxes and deliberately keeping the prices higher. Under these circumstances, what right does Mr Modi have to ask people to give up subsidies voluntarily?
To insinuate that not giving up LPG ‘subsidy’ is tantamount to not contributing to nation-building, leeching off government dole is a white lie. Most of the people who Modi expects to buy expensive cylinders are already paying huge chunks of their income to the government, for cross-subsidising many of its social schemes.
Most of us pay 10 to 33 per cent of our salary as income tax, whose slabs finance minister Arun Jaitley did not bother changing even after berating the UPA for being unkind to the middle class. In addition, there are several other taxes—VAT, service tax, toll tax, house tax, municipality tax, garbage collection tax, cess for education, cess for Swacch Bharat, clean Ganga, fuel surcharge…the list is long. (A back-of-the-hand calculation would reveal that a person in the highest-tax bracket ends up paying nearly half of his income to the government.)
The government has almost withdrawn from school education, leaving the field open for the private players who overcharge us (another form of tax due to government incompetence). The government’s healthcare system has collapsed, where, again, private players are thriving. There is no form of social security for the old, handicapped, ill and the unemployed. The government doesn’t spend enough on keeping roads and streets safe for its citizens; it ignores the environment and does nothing to check pollution of air, water and other resources.
No, Prime Minister, we are already doing our best for nation-building. It is time the government repaid some of our generosity instead of asking for more charity through emotional atyachar.
You manage your finances, and let us deal with our kitchen and conscience.