BHUBANESWAR: The State Government and Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IOCL) will file a joint petition in the Orissa High Court informing it about the agreement reached between the two parties to resolve the tax dispute over the Paradip oil refinery.
The issue was discussed at the meeting of the State Cabinet presided over by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. It was decided that the Finance Department will take necessary action in this regard in consultation with the Law Department.
Chief Secretary AP Padhi told mediapersons that as per the agreement, the viability gap funding for the Paradip refinery will be revised to `700 crore per annum payable in four equal instalments in each quarter in the form of interest free loan for 15 years starting from 2016-17. The repayment of the interest free loan by IOCL will start in the 16th year from each instalment.
The IOCL will deposit `2742.37 crore immediately towards withholding of VAT from December, 2015 to June, 2017. Padhi said Odisha Government will waive interest of `224.33 crore upto August 31, 2017 calculated at one per cent per month towards VAT withheld by the IOCL and such other interest from July till date. Besides, the penalty payable by IOCL for the withheld payment has also been waived, he said.
The Cabinet approved the mobile towers, optical fibre cable and related telecom infrastructure policy, 2017 which emphasises on streamlining the process of application and grant of permission in reasonable time frame, liberal permission fees and rationalisation of procedure. The Chief Secretary said the policy covers the modalities for installation of mobile towers, cell on wheel, micro cell, inbuilding solutions, optical fibre laying and setting up of end equipment.
Special provisions have been made in this policy for KBK and LWE affected areas, Padhi said and added that the policy will help in establishment of modern telecommunication infrastructure to provide high speed internet in rural areas. Besides, it will improve terrestrial broadband connectivity in both urban and rural areas.
The Chief Secretary said, there is a provision of dealing with public grievances relating to installation of towers and issues related to telecom infrastructure in the policy through district and state-level telecom committees.
The Cabinet also approved food and procurement policy for 2017-18 Kharif Marketing Season (KMS) and fixed a tentative procurement target of 36 lakh tonne rice which comes to around 53 lakh tonne in terms of paddy. The Chief Secretary said the target is for entire Kharif and Rabi procurement. While kharif paddy will be procured from November, 2017 to April, 2018, Rabi paddy will be procured in May and June, 2018. In KMS 2015-16 and 2016-17, 50.87 lakh tonne and 54.27 lakh tonne paddy was procured respectively.
The Chief Secretary said, paddy will be procured from farmers who are registered in the online portal of the Food Supply and Consumer Welfare department. Paddy will be procured as per the minimum support price (MSP) fixed by the Centre at ` 1550 per quintal for common variety and `1590 per quintal for Grade-A variety.
Besides, the Cabinet decided to waive interest of `3.57 crore for delayed payment levied against Kerala Dinesh Beedi workers' Central Co-op Society, Kerala on purchase of kendu leaf. The case was pending since 1974.