Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel has written a letter to Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitaraman and has requested sanction of Excise Duty to Chhattisgarh as it was provided before. He has stated in the letter that the year 2020-21 has been an extremely difficult financial year, because of the pandemic. This year, due to the adverse impact of pandemic on all the economic activities, State’s own financial sources are expected to decrease by about 30 per cent. Recently, in the Union Budget for year 2021-22, reduction in excise duty of petroleum products, gold and silver and many other items and imposition of ‘Agricultural Infrastructure Development Cess’ has been announced.

 

This is expected to cause an additional loss of Rs 900 to 1,000 crore to State in the coming financial year. Baghel has further stated in the letter that the State is yet to receive the amount of Rs 3,700 crore in the GST compensation fund from Central Government in the financial year 2020-21. After announcing 60 lakh tonnee rice quota for Chhattisgarh in past, Central Government has reduced the rice quota of State by 16 lakh tonne, due to which State is likely to suffer a huge loss in the disposal of additional paddy collected by State.

 

Chief Minister has also stated in the letter that the decision to set up ‘Agricultural Infrastructure Development Fund’ is welcome, but the decision to reduce excise duty would certainly have adverse effect on the resources of State. The excise duty deduction would cause additional damage to State and its public welfare programme. He has requested the Union Finance Minister that in view of the limited resources available to states as compared to the Centre, Chhattisgarh should be provided ex-gratia amount as excise duty. This would save State from additional financial loss.