Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday said that the central government’s opposition to free of cost services and provisions to the citizens showed that its finances were in a bad shape.
“Never in the past 75 years has the government taxed basic food grains,” he said in a video message. “Tax over petrol and diesel is over Rs 1,000 crore,” Kejriwal said. “They are now saying all free things by the government should end…Where did all of the Centre’s money go?”
Kejriwal’s made the comments a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi criticised the Opposition parties for offering freebies to voters. At an event in Panipat on Wednesday, Modi said that such announcements increase the burden on taxpayers and stop the country from becoming self-reliant.
In July too, the prime minister had described promising freebies to voters as “revdi culture”. Revdi is a sweet made of jaggery and sesame.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay has filed a plea seeking directions to file criminal cases against political parties for luring voters with freebies. At a hearing on the plea on Thursday, Chief Justice of India NV Ramana orally remarked that freebies and social welfare schemes were not the same thing.
On Thursday, Kejriwal also criticised the Centre for waiving off debts of “some rich friends”.
“The taxpayers think that the government took the tax from them on the promise of giving facilities, instead they are using that money to waive off their rich friends’ loans,” he said. “...They waived taxes worth 5 lakh crore of super rich people.”
The Delhi chief minister also questioned the Centre’s Agnipath scheme for short-term recruitment into the armed forces.
“It is for the first time in the country’s history that the government is justifying a scheme like the Agnipath Yojna,” he said. “It said it is being done so the government does not have to pay pensions to defence personnel anymore.”
The Agnipath scheme was announced by the government on June 14. Under this scheme, citizens aged between 17-and-a-half to 21 years are eligible to apply for four-year service in the armed forces.
On June 18, the Union home and defence ministries had announced a 10% job quota in the two departments for those who do not get selected for permanent recruitment in the armed forces.
The decision was made amid violent protests across the country against the short-term recruitment scheme to the armed forces. Protestors demanded permanent recruitment under the regular process, along with pension and other retirement benefits that are not part of the Agnipath scheme.
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