If the reports coming from the power corridors of Amaravati, Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu is learnt to have decided to give relief to the citizens by reducing the Value Added Tax (VAT) on diesel and petrol in the State.
According to these reports, Naidu has proposed to announce a reduction of Rs 2 each on a litre of petrol and diesel, instead of a specific percentage reduction in the VAT.
The reduction is expected to cause a burden of around Rs 1150 crore on the state exchequer.
As per the latest reports, Naidu was discussing on the issue with the higher officials at his chamber in Assembly. He is likely to make an announcement to this effect shortly.
“Since the Central Government is not responding on petrol prices, Naidu is doing exercise to give relief to public,” TDP sources said.
Though it is financially a tough decision, Naidu thinks it will give a tremendous political mileage to the TDP. Since the Centre might also go in for a reduction of central excise duty in the wake of elections, it will give a big relief to the consumers.
So, Naidu can claim credit for both the reductions saying that he had taken a decision and also forced the Centre to come down on its knees, since the public have been suffering due to steep raise of petrol and they resorted to staging protests across the State on Monday.