Petroleum under GST: No dispatch from Centre yet
SHILLONG, March 10: The Meghalaya government will have to look at revenue implications before extending any suggestion to the Centre on inclusion of petroleum products under the GST regime, Excise Minister James Sangma said in the Assembly today.
Making it clear that the state government has not relieved any communication from the Centre in this regard, Sangma said, “If any communication comes, we will look at the revenue implications before taking any decision.”
The minister was replying to a short duration discussion on the high price of fuel which has been burning a hole in the common man’s pocket.
Sangma also informed the House that Meghalaya has the second lowest rates of taxes levied on petrol and diesel among the Northeastern states.
CM silent on pending GHADC salaries
SHILLONG, March 10: The Opposition members were hoping for a clear cut reply from Chief Minister Conrad Sangma on the strategy the government would adopt to clear the salary of GHADC employees which has been pending for over 30 months. They were left disappointed as the CM’s reply to the discussion on the Governor’s address neither mentioned any plan nor any assurance to the hundreds of employees. Instead, he blamed the previous Congress-led EC for the financial mess in the GHADC.
Sangma said that the monthly revenue of GHADC comes to around Rs 1.2 crore whereas the expenditure on the salary component alone comes to over Rs 4 crore each month.
Sangma said that the Council had a strength of around 1300 employees in 2011-12 but between 2013-15, the Congress-led EC appointed 720 employees in an arbitrary manner and without any payroll which hiked the salary expenditure from Rs 1.8 crore to Rs 3.8 crore p.m.
“Because of their decision to appoint 720 people, the District Council is suffering till today,” the CM added.
The Cm was also quick to pat himself on the back by lauding the NPP-led EC of coming up with detailed payroll and computerisation and automation of the entire system to ensure that only genuine employees work in the council.
“Now we have a payroll and employees are getting their salaries directly into their accounts,” he said while informing that the number of employees in the council has come down from 2300 to 1670.
“The remaining employees are ghost staff,” the CM stated.