Manav Mander Ludhiana, August 18 City’s industry has accused the Centre for discrimination against Punjab as it extends tax exemption under special industrial package to J&K, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh till 2027. Chairman, Knitwear Club, Vinod Thapar and General Secretary, Knitwear and Textiles Club, Charanjiv Singh, urged the state government to take up the issue of extending the tax exemption to Punjab under the special package. At the same time, both have also strongly urged the Union Minister from Punjab, Vijay Sampla and Harsimrat Badal to plead their case for including Punjab in the central scheme of special package to bail out the ailing industry. “The special package of the centre was to be over by 2018 but it has been again extended till 2027 which will prove a death knell to the local industry. We were just hoping for the special package to get over but once again the government has given step motherly treatment to us by extending the package and not giving any such benefit to Punjab state,” said Tarsem Singla who runs a knitwear unit at Bajwa Nagar. The knitwear industry in Ludhiana is passing through a critical period. The industry is looking for central policy assistance for survival. Thousands of units in small-scale and cottage sectors associated with it are on the brink of closure as direct fallout of the exclusion of Punjab’s industry from the special package for over one and half decades since the special package for industrial promotion was given to the Himalayan states. The 12 to 28 per cent rate on various knitwear products under recently implemented Goods and Services Tax (GST) has dealt a death below. The industry here has reached a bankruptcy stage. The continuing decline has not only caused a severe crisis of survival, the denial of package has also caused loss to the state exchequer, said another small scale hosiery manufacture, Sumeet Kapila. Gurmeet Singh Kular, President Federation of Industrial and Commercial Undertaking has also strongly opposed the decision of Government of india and said that when GST was imposed, it was made clear that there will be no discrimination in India, One Nation One Tax. But this decision will directly hit the industry of Punjab who is already suffering because of recession. Bains brothers worried about industrialists The Bains brothers- Balwinder Singh Bains and Simarjit Singh Bains, from Lok Insaf Party, have expressed their worries that the Central Government had extended the industrial package to the neighboring Himalyan states till 2027. In a press release issued on Friday, both Bains brothers said it was a major set-back for the industrialists in Punjab.

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