Port Blair, Feb 02: The Non-Gazetted Govt. Officers’ Association, Andaman and Nicobar Islands has expressed disappointment over the Union Budget for 2017-18 presented in the Lok Sabha on 01.02.2017 by the Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitly as it does not address any of the issues raised by the organizations of Central Government Employees and Workers. The Finance Minister who presented the budget amidst high expectations and hopes, has not mentioned a word on various pending issues of Govt. employees includes revision of allowances in the 7th CPC.
The proposed reduction in the rate of taxation for individual assesses between income of 2.5 lakh to 5 lakhs from 10% to 5% is just a pea nut as there is no reduction in taxation rate for the income of 5-10 lakh which continues to be at 20% and above 10 lakh at 30%. Whereas corporate tax of companies with annual turn-over upto 50 crores is brought down by 5%. Also the Association denounces the proposed large scale privatization in Railways and other public sector enterprises.
Further, there is no proposal from the Finance Minister to control spiraling prices. As the Government is contemplating implementation of Goods and Services Tax(GST) from July,2017, more tax burden is in the offing for lower and middle class people.
