A growing clamor for Special Category Status in Andhra Pradesh has led to State-wide protests, and heated debates inside and outside Parliament in last couple of years. Recently Jagan announced their party MPs will resign by 6th April if special category status is not granted. Though it is late, if any one sincerely fighting for special category status, it is definitely appreciable. But it seems Jagan, who wants to fight for SCS, himself doesn’t understand clearly what Special Category status is. The comments he made in a recent interview did raise many a eyebrow.
In a recent interview, he told – “If Special Category Status (SCS) is granted to the state, we don’t have to pay Income taxes.” Is that true? Some people really went back and checked the facts. Obviously, it is not true. Jagan might have misunderstood or mistaken. But as he is saying during Padayatra, such statements mislead common man. If such incorrect notions are formed as base for SCS, people may get disappointed even after getting SCS, as they have wrong expectations.
By the way what benefits does a state gets if SCS is granted?
- 30 percent of Union budget goes to ‘special category’ states.
- Special Category states are benefited because of this Normal Central Assistance always spent in favor of these SCS states.
- In addition, Special Central Assistance given to SCS states for economic development.
- Center bears 90% of the state expenditure (given as grant) on all centrally-sponsored schemes and only 10% is to be paid back (loan) by state to center. In case of other states, they have to payback 30% to the center.
- Earlier, there were some tax incentives as part of SCS on central excise duty etc, but after GST implementation, entire nation is brought under single umbrella as far as taxes are concerned. So, there won’t be much benefit in this regard
So, obviously, there will be no rebate in income tax for the people belonging to SCS states
-Zuran
