The Leader of the Opposition, Ramesh Chennithala, has said with the presentation of the Finance Bill in the House by the Left Democratic Front (LDF) government, the State has been gripped by a price rise spree.
“Through the Budget presented by Finance Minister Thomas Isaac, the government had imposed an additional tax burden more than Rs.805 crore on the common man.”
Mr. Chennithala said this while addressing a demonstration organised by the District Congress Committee (DCC) in front of the District Collectorate here on Monday to register protest against the hike in stamp duty and registration fee and other alleged anti-people policies of the LDF government. The demonstration was part of the State-wide exercise by the Congress in front of the Secretariat and all 14 district collectorates.
The hike in stamp duty and registration fee cannot in anyway be justified since it has affected all families. If the during the UDF rule the registration fee used to be Rs.10,100 for a cent of land, it has been hiked to Rs.50,000 by the LDF government, he said.
The previous United Democratic Front government never burdened the common man with taxes. “People are now unable to partition their land; this anti-people fee hike has to be immediately withdrawn.” Mr. Chennithala said that the tax hike on freight trucks imposed by the government would only lead to price rise of all essential commodities.
He alleged that the law and order situation too was getting worse in Kerala under the LDF rule. The recent one in this connection was the stand-off between lawyers and media persons. The situation worsened because the police stood mute spectators and allowed it to worsen. “Within two months of Pinarayi Vijayan rule, 49 murders had taken place in the State.”
Mr. Chennithala said that the LDF government wanted to keep the people of the State in the dark about all government decisions. This was the reason why the LDF government was working towards torpedoing the Right To Information Act. The DCC president Kodikunnil Suresh presided over the dharna.
