The West Bengal Chief Minister and Chairperson of All India Trinamool Congress (AITMC), Ms Mamata Banerjee, today served an ultimatum to the Congress-led UPA-II coalition at the Centre against any further hike in petroleum product prices. She, however, indicated that her party would not push for an immediate roll back of the Rs 1.80 a litre petrol price increase on November 3.
With 19 MPs in the Lok Sabha and seven in the Rajya Sabha, Trinamool is the largest ally of UPA-II coalition. A delegation of party MPs coupled with senior State Minister, Mr Partha Chatterjee, today intimated the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, about Trinamool's stand.
“If prices of petrol, diesel, LPG and other such petro-products for mass use are hiked any further, we will quit the Government,” Ms Banerjee said in an interview to a local news channel this evening while briefing the outcome of today's meeting in Delhi.
“We are not merely opposing a petrol price hike. We hear that a proposal for partial phase out of subsidy on LPG and decontrol of diesel prices are currently up for consideration of the Group of Ministers (GoM) in Delhi. And, this our greatest fear. We will not accept any such move,” she said.
According to her, during today's meeting the Prime Minister clarified that no such move was considered at this juncture.
“However, he (Dr Manmohan Singh) was non-committal about the possibility of such moves in the future,” Ms Banerjee said.
“As a responsible partner, we had been patient so far even in the face of unrelenting hike in price petro-products but no more,” she said.
Refusing to buy the argument that rise in crude oil prices in the international market forced oil marketing companies to escalate domestic petrol prices, she said that oil companies did not reduce prices as and when international prices dropped.
Economic assistance
In Kolkata, Ms Banerjee and her Finance Minister, Mr Amit Mitra, met the Union Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, at the Governor House.
“We discussed issues related to financial condition of the State,” Ms Banerjee said in a brief reply to the newspersons.