The Hindu Business Line : Cut taxes on oil: CPI leader

Chennai, Jan.19 The Left parties are opposed to price hikes in oil and have advocated a reduction in taxes and excise duties as well as a cut in the “conspicuous consumption of oil”, said Mr Gurudas Dasgupta, CPI leader.

Speaking to Business Line on the sidelines of a party conference, Mr Dasgupta said India, which imports 70 per cent of its oil requirements, was a prisoner to the volatility of international oil prices. But hiking fuel prices was not the solution.

“That would be the easiest solution but (it) may be not in common man’s interests,” he said.

SBI merger

Mr D. Raja, MP and CPI leader, expressed concern about the proposed merger of State Bank of India and its 7 associate banks.

He said he had written to the Prime Minister on this issue to seek his personal intervention.

He was critical of the proposal from the SBI management, to extend three-retirement benefits (gratuity, provident fund and pension), when most bank managements had been pleading lack of adequate funds to continue even two retirement benefits.

The boards of the six SBI associate banks are slated to meet soon to consider an in-principle nod for their merger with SBI.