Gas price hike: BJP rejects Arvind Kejriwal's charge against Narendra Modi

NEW DELHI: Two senior BJP leaders, Arun Jaitley, the leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha, and Ravi Shankar Prasad, the deputy leader in the upper house, issued statements on Wednesday that appeared intended to counter Aam Admi Party ( AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal’s charge that BJP, along with Congress, is siding with RIL chairman Mukesh Ambani on gas pricing.

Speaking to ET, Jaitley said that the next government might “reconsider or revisit” the gas pricing mechanism and described the UPA government’s new formula for gas pricing as "unclear". The BJP leader, who is contesting the Amritsar Lok Sabha seat, said that if an NDA government is voted to power its policy on the issue will be "responsible and not populist" without elaborating on any of these points.

An AAP pamphlet released in Varanasi on Tuesday had launched a scathing attack on Modi on this issue. "If Modi is voted to power he will increase the gas prices to $16 per unit as opposed to $8 proposed by the UPA government. The party says the cost per unit of gas comes to $1 but Modi has already written to the Prime minister to increase it to $16," AAP has alleged.

Countering AAP’s allegations, Ravi Shankar Prasad said his party’s view on gas pricing was the same as that of Parliament’s Standing Committee on Finance. "The Standing Committee of Finance of Parliament headed by the BJP leader Yashwant Sinha has seriously questioned the gas pricing policy and sought review of the same," Prasad said. Asked if this is also the official view of the BJP, Prasad said, "Of course, it is."

The price hike, now deferred on account of the intervention of the Election Commission, is based on a analysis carried out by C Rangarajan. The formula was accepted by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs in June 2013.