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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | LPG subsidy may soon go for the rich, Arun Jaitley says

LPG subsidy may soon go for the rich, Arun Jaitley says

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published Published on Nov 22, 2014   modified Modified on Nov 22, 2014
-The Times of India

NEW DELHI: If you are economically well off, you may soon have to pay full market price for your cooking gas refills.

"The next important decision India will have to take is whether people like me ... (are) entitled to get our LPG (liquefied cooking gas) subsidy," finance minister Arun Jaitley said here on Friday.

"I think the sooner we are able to take these decisions as to who is entitled to these subsidies - of course some people would be - the better it would be for our system. These decisions are all on our agenda," he said outlining the current thinking in the government.

The government at present subsidizes 12 cylinders for each household in a year. A subsidized refill costs Rs 414 in Delhi, while the market price for the 14.2kg domestic cylinder stands at Rs 880. The Centre provided a subsidy of Rs 1,904 crore on cooking gas in 2013-14.

The present system does not differentiate between rich and poor households. So whether the consumer is an industrialist living in a mansion or a poor peon in a tenement, both get 12 subsidized cylinders in a year. In August, oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan nudged state-run oil companies to launch an SMS campaign urging consumers to voluntarily surrender subsidy on cooking gas. But that move hasn't met with much success.

Indicating it was time to take a hard decision on subsidy, Jaitley said, "Once political leadership, particularly the man at the top, has decisiveness, the most complicated of the decisions will also become simple. One does not have to wait for years to decide on coal blocks or what to do with spectrum or natural resources, or with diesel pricing or with gas pricing."

The finance minister said some of these decisions had seemed complicated over the years but the new government wasted no time and simply took a call on them. "I think that's the agenda we continue to follow."

The NDA government has taken several quick steps to break the policy paralysis that had gripped the oil sector due to controversy over gas price revision. In October, the Centre announced the new gas pricing formula and deregulated diesel pricing. Last week, a modified direct benefit transfer scheme for cooking gas was launched to better target subsidy and plug leakage.

The oil ministry under S Jaipal Reddy's watch during UPA-II regime had drawn up a similar proposal to take the rich out of the subsidy net as part of the overall plan to prune cooking gas subsidy, first reported by ToI on July 9, 2011.

The proposal was dumped almost as soon as it was put on paper due to stiff opposition from within the Congress and alliance partners. It suggested asking anyone who owned a car, two-wheeler or a house; or figured in the income-tax list to pay market price for cooking gas.


The Times of India, 22 November, 2014, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/LPG-subsidy-may-soon-go-for-the-rich-Arun-Jaitley-says/articleshow/45236742.cms


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