Withdrawal of oil cess in West Bengal to increase state’s revenue

SILIGURI: Not ‘slogan shouting,’ ‘bandhs’ or a ‘movements.’ But there is another way, at least in West Bengal, that can reduce petro price load while increasing state revenue. And as obvious outcome of these two, ruling party of the state can have its much needed political mileage before forthcoming rural body election.

The key is in the revenue structure in petro price in West Bengal. WB charges Rs 1 cess on every liter of Petrol and Diesel. In addition, 25% and 17% sales tax in Petrol and Diesel respectively. Put together, the state earns Rs. 15.48 per liter of petrol and Rs. 8.64 on a liter of Diesel.

“Even if state cannot reduce the sales tax, it should withdraw the cess. This will in practice increase total revenue earning,” said Mr. S. Kolay, General Secretary, West Bengal Petroleum Dealers Association( WBPDA).

“West Bengal comes in between heavy national level traffic flow between entire North East region and rest part of the country. With a slight reframing of the taxation structure, West Bengal can grab lion’s share of the total consumption of these fleets,” said Mr. M. Tambakuwala, Secretary North Bengal Petroleum Dealers Association(NBPDA), affiliated to WBPDA.

As he explained, petro price in adjoining Bihar in west and Assam in East are now almost same with West Bengal. But without cess, the price will be lower here. Naturally, almost every vehicle will refill in Bengal while entering here and again before leaving the sate giving significant boost to total sale and thus revenue earning volume.

In addition to this, “Large section of general people and vehicles attached to eastern Himalayan tourism circuits are frequenters in adjoining Nepal, Bhutan or Sikkim. They always refill from those countries or state offering cheaper rates. Thus, Northern West Bengal alone looses around 12,000KL Diesel and 2000 KL petro sales a month. Withdrawal of cess will definitely discourage this trend,” said Mr. S. Paul Chowdhury, President, NBPDA.

According to IOC officials North Bengal’s present consumption as around 43,000 KL of Diesel and 9,500 KL of Petrol a month through around 300 outlets against over 1400 outlets in the whole state.

Importantly, the withdrawal can offer major relief to the mass and thus bring in political mileage for Trinamool Congress, the ruling party in the state. This can come too beneficial to the party in the next Panchayat election- opined political observers.