Withdraw cess: Grocers Association petition

Coimbatore: Coimbatore Grocers’ Association Honorary Advisor Bhaskaran, President Prabhakar and others submitted a petition to Tamil Nadu Finance Minister Palanivel Thiagarajan: The Tamil Nadu government should provide facilities for the sale of agricultural products in regulated sales halls in the areas where agricultural products are grown. Even though ‘cess’ tax has been paid in the respective state for the produce purchased, ‘cess’ tax is collected again in Tamil Nadu for the same products. As market fee, the government has got about 85 crore rupees as revenue for the year 2020-21. From this revenue, the regulation outlets should be well maintained. In this situation, middle and lower class people, traders in grocery stores, food manufacturing companies, wholesalers with warehouses are affected by the new agricultural produce law brought by the Tamil Nadu government. Due to this, instead of revenue coming to the government, businessmen will be threatened by officials. Keeping these in mind, the government should exempt 40 essential agricultural products from cess. According to the petition, business conducted outside the regulated market should also be exempted from charging the market fee (cess).