BJP-PDP retains Lakhanpur Toll Plaza to appease separatists: Harsh
STATE TIMES NEWS
JAMMU: Accusing the BJP of being hand in glove with PDP for safeguarding the so called J&K’s special position over the implementation of Modified GST by continuing to impose Toll Tax on the trucks carrying goods into the State at Lakhanpur Toll Plaza, Panther activists spearheaded by former Minister and Chairman JKNPP Harsh Dev Singh on Thursday staged a protest at Exhibition Ground Jammu.
The agitated protestors while raising anti-government slogans torched the effigy of the BJP-PDP combine and sought immediate abolition of the said tax in J&K like other states of the country in the interest of the traders and the consumers.
Asserting that the continuation of Lakhanpur Toll Plaza in J&K had isolated the State from rest of India in the new tax regime, Harsh Dev regretted that the BJP-PDP coalition had despicably succumbed to the dictates of the secessionist forces in the valley by appeasing those who had waged an open war with India that it had not sailed in the Indian mainstream on GST but resorted to modify the new tax regime for its implementation in the State.
He said that the State government imposing toll tax at Lakhanpur on trucks carrying goods into the State had led to ‘Double Taxation’ which overtly violated the very principle of “one nation, one tax” which formed the very foundation of GST. Asserting that the extra levy made goods costlier, he sought immediate closure of the Lakhanpur Toll Plaza in the interest of the trading community and the common masses. He said that any additional levies and cesses in J&K in addition to GST making essential commodities costlier shall be vigorously agitated by the Panthers party.