The ongoing dispute over the money available in the bank accounts of institutions listed in the IX and X Schedules of the AP Reorganisation Act, 2014, took a new turn after the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) transferring Rs 1,274 crore from the Telangana government’s account towards IT dues.
The RBI has violated the AP Reorganisation Act and transferred the amount without any prior notice to state government, as per a representation submitted to Union finance minister Arun Jaitley in Delhi on Saturday by Telangana IT minister KT Rama Rao. Rama Rao, who was in New Delhi on Saturday, called on Jaitley and explained him about how the RBI had ‘violated’ the norms and transferred the amount from the state government’s account. He urged Jaitley to ensure that the debited amount is re-deposited into the account of TS government. After meeting Jaitley, Rao said the Union finance minister had promised that he would direct Revenue secretary to look into the issue. AP Beverages Corporation Limited (APBCL), which is listed in the IX Schedule of AP Reorganisation Act is supposed to pay income tax to the tune of Rs 2,900 crore. The Income Tax department served notices on APBCL, which was not bifurcated so far as per APRA, 2014. But, the APBCL, which received IT notices for the transactions in the combined AP, approached the Court on the matter.
Against this backdrop, the RBI recently transferred Rs 1,274 crore from Telangana government’s account towards the IT dues of APBCL. “The state government will not pay income tax. The APBCL is not yet bifurcated. How, can the RBI debit money from TS account?” wondered Rama Rao.
The RBI should have waited till the APBCL was bifurcated by the Sheela Bhide committee, Rao said. “If the RBI wants to recover the money, it should have done it by adopting 52:48 share. That means, it should have recovered the IT dues from accounts of both AP and TS governments,” he opined.
The dispute over bank accounts of institutions listed in IX and X Schedules was confined not only to APBCL. The AP government recently directed its officials to transfer the money available in the bank accounts of X schedule institutions into PD accounts. The TS government directed its officials that all the X Schedule institutions located in Telangana belongs to Telangana and see that the funds in bank accounts were not diverted by the AP government.