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AP seeks tax sops on par with SCS
Andhra Pradesh on Saturday sought tax incentives for industrial development, in line with those extended to states enjoying Special Category Status (SCS).
Vijayawada/Thiruvananthapuram: Andhra Pradesh on Saturday sought tax incentives for industrial development, in line with those extended to states enjoying Special Category Status (SCS).
Finance minister Buggana Rajendranath Reddy, who represented the state at the 30th Southern Zonal Council meet in Thiruvananthapuram which was chaired by Union home minister Amit Shah, said growth prospects of AP diminished due to loss of Hyderabad and other industrially-developed areas (consequent to the state bifurcation in 2014).
"Steps for promoting industrialisation are imperative for the development of the successor state. Section 94 of the AP Reorganisation Act, 2014, and assurances made in Parliament provide for tax incentives. The state requests for extending the tax incentives on the lines of those being provided to the special category states (SCS) and north eastern states," the finance minister requested.
The incentives would help place development of the state on a firm footing and an accelerated growth trajectory, he added.
"Per contra, no incentives have been provided to AP under Section 94[1] while meagre incentives have been provided, that too for a period five years only, under Section 94[2]," he noted.
Rajendranath Reddy said Andhra Pradesh "suffered enormously" for almost a decade from the consequences of bifurcation and non-fulfilment of the "solemn assurances" made.
"It is now universally acknowledged that the division of the state of Andhra Pradesh was made in an unscientific, injudicious and unjust manner. However, even after the lapse of a period of almost a decade, several key provisions of the (APR) Act and assurances are yet to be implemented both in letter and spirit, aggravating the distress resulting from the bifurcation," he lamented. The minister requested the Centre to consider and put in place a suitably empowered and effective mechanism to take necessary decisions on the pending issues (between AP and Telangana) and monitor their implementation.
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