Ministry of Home Affairs joint secretary Ashish Kumar has averred that there is no scope for amending the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act 2014.
The senior official’s assertion came during the recent bilateral meeting between the MHA and representatives of two Telugu States – Telangana and Andhra Pradesh – held virtually. He was responding to the fervent appeal made by the representative of Andhra Pradesh seeking settlement of anomaly in taxation matters under Sections 50, 51 and 56 of the Reorganisation Act.
The AP Government contended that there was differential treatment of the recovery of tax and refund in comparison to other States Reorganisation Acts. The recovery of tax was on location basis and the refund was on population basis. This was unfair to the State and it should be treated on an equitable basis.
He recalled the MHA’s previous observation that Principle of Uniformity should be applied for AP with regard to taxation anomalies and said if it was too late to amend the Reorganisation Act, the overall loss borne by AP should be reimbursed by the Central Government or some sort of compensation could be given to correct the unfair or inequity of the Act.
The Telangana Government was firm that amendment of the Act would lead to looking back at the settled issue. The Government’s stand was that whatever the provisions were in the Act, they should not be amended. The government refused to make comments on the issues raised by AP claiming that it was between the AP Government and the Centre to resolve.
The Department of Revenue too was of the view that AP Government could take up the issue with Department of Expenditure in case it wanted compensation for the loss of revenue. Responding to the views expressed by the two States and Department of Revenue, the MHA joint secretary said that since there was no scope for amending the Reorganisation Act, the AP Government should treat it as settled and move on further.
He assured that the issue would be taken up with competent authority for further action and the issue should not be treated as a bilateral issue any longer. “The Government of India will work on the issue with the State of Andhra Pradesh to see what further can be done on this,” he said.
