Telangana: Harish Rao urges centre to hike FRBM limit by 5 per cent

State Finance Minister T. Harish Rao has urged the central government to increase the debt ceiling for states under the FRBM Act from 4 to 5 per cent. He said that the lockdown is being implemented in Telangana in the wake of Covid-19 and the state was facing financial difficulties due to this. Harish Rao expressed this concern at the 44th meeting of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council chaired by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday.

The meeting in Delhi was attended by Harish Rao from the state secretariat and even state chief secretary S Somesh Kumar and trade tax commissioner Neetu Kumari Prasad were also present in the meeting via video conference. Harish Rao said that the states were turning weak financially due to the lockdown and Telangana had lost revenue of Rs 4,100 crore in the month of May alone. He said raising the FRBM limit would boost the economic activity of the states and create job opportunities. Nirmala Sitharaman responded by assuring that the FRBM limit increase would be considered.

Harish Rao appealed to the Center to take up free vaccination as soon as possible in the wake of the predictions of a third wave of Covid-19. They demanded that all the people of the country should be given free vaccination and that the vaccine distribution program to the states should be completed fast too. He said, if needed vaccines should be imported from other countries. Harish supported the recommendations of the Cabinet sub-committee headed by Meghalaya CM Sangma on the imposition of GST on oxygen cylinders, oximeters, sanitisers, ventilators and other medical equipment.