Govt to Levy Tax on Petrol, Diesel to Fund Swaatch Bharat Initiative

BENGALURU: In order to fund for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Swachh  Bharat Abhiyaan campaign,  the countrymen who will end up paying more this year. The campaign that was initiated on October 2014, involves a total budget of Rs 2.23 lakh crore  and is expected to carry forward till October2019. The measures that will be implemented as a part of this initiative include a  0.5percent cess on petrol, diesel and telecom services, a 1percent cess on waste produced by mineral generation plants and a 0.5 percent increase in service tax, reports Economic Times.

The Modi government also imposed 0.5percent Swachh Bharat cess on taxable services from November 2015.

A senior officer from ET reveals that the government has a  plan to introduce long-term, tax-free Swachh Bharat bonds to raise funds.

Post approval by the finance ministry, the  Swaatch Bharat monetary plans are expected to be announced in the February budget. The idea has already been proposed by Niti Aayog which is in touch with all the states for the  Swachh  Bharat program. The official said, "Government is considering all options to raise funds for the programme and one or more of these could be announced as we go forward." The fund raising plans have been proposed by a sub group of chief ministers put together Niti Aayog.

This subgroup of CMs believes that the states and Centre should jointly go forward with implementing the Swachh Bharat program. The group said, “the sharing pattern of funds for this programme between the Centre and states may be in the ratio of 75:25, while for hilly states it may be kept at 90:10."The group also recommended that the states should issue Swachh Bharat bonds that are exempted from tax by the centre..

The Swachh  Bharat program by the  Indian government includes plans of building household toilets,, community or public toilets and adopting  scientific measures for efficient  waste management. The total cost of the program is estimated to be around 2.23 lakh crores, of which  1.34lakh crore will be spent on implementing it in the rural areas  while the urban areas will receive  62, 010 crores to do the same. Under rural  employment program of Swachh  Bharat brackets of expense has been allotted for school toilets (Rs 2,528 crore), anganwadi toilets (Rs 768 crore) and individual toilets also.

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