New Delhi: As the Trinamool Congress MPs are set to meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over petrol price rise on Tuesday, here are some options before the Prime Minister.
He can promise a financial package for West Bengal. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wants Rs 20,000 crore as a package but the Finance Minister, in charge of the nation's purse strings, has said that he can't allot more than Rs 9,000 crore. The Prime Minister could increase the amount to placate the Trinamool Chief.
Another option, the one that the Congress party favours, is to from a UPA Coordination Committee along the lines of the Left-Coordination Committee that existed during UPA1.
Option three is that the Centre can slash some taxes on petrol, which could slightly reduce the impact of the latest hike.
But Congress sources point out that 7 per cent of the Centre's tax earning from petrol is passed off to West Bengal anyway and the state earns Rs 15.13 per litre from cess and sales tax. So it is the West Bengal government that could reduce taxes instead of the Centre.
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