HYDERABAD: Telugu Desam president and leader of the opposition in the state Assembly N Chandrababu Naidu has demanded that the Congress-led UPA government roll back the diesel, LPG and kerosene price increases immediately.Talking with reporters at his party headquarters here on Saturday, the former chief minister said that if the government did not concede their demand, people would teach the ruling party a fitting lesson at an appropriate time in near future.Accusing the Congress government of working against the party’s election manifesto in which it had promised control of the prices of essential commodities, he said the TDP would continue its fight in and outside Parliament along with all other-like minded opposition parties at the national level. At the same time, it will also fight for rollback of the prices in the state. In the coming few days, the TDP would organise demonstrations at all district headquarters to expose UPA government’s undemocratic and unilateral decision of increasing the prices, he announced. The fuel price rise would affect the poorest of the poor and force people to revert to traditional methods, he said. The TDP chief accused the central and state governments of looting people and remarked that Union petroleum minister S Jaipal Reddy was mesmerising people by suppressing the facts.“Both the governments have become arrogant and because of that they issued a warning to the people they would increase the prices of petroleum products again in the coming days.”In the last seven years the central government hiked petrol price 21 times by imposing an additional Rs 30,000-crore burden on the people. After the latest hike another Rs 3,000 crore additional financial burden on people once again, Naidu said. Dismissing Jaipal Reddy’s argument that the price hike was inevitable, Naidu contended that if the central and state governments were ready to reduce taxes and control corruption, they could reduce the fuel prices. The oil companies had earned a profit of Rs 10,500 lakh crore last year, he pointed out. “If the international market prices of crude oil have gone up, how are Bangladesh and Sri Lanka governments able to supply petroleum products at cheaper prices in their countries?” Naidu asked.He said the state government was imposing additional taxes unlike in other states. He said he was surprised that the Congress government in the state imposed 4 per cent tax even on kerosene which was used by the poor.
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