BJP Tamil Nadu president K Annamalai, has issued an apology after a video of the Managing Director of Tamil Nadu’s famous Sree Annapoorna hotel apologising to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman for his comments on the Union government’s Goods and Services Tax was released by local BJP functionaries.
In the video, Srinivasan, who is also the honorary president of Tamil Nadu Hotels Association, can be seen apologising to the FM for his critical comments on GST at a previous event. The video shows Nirmala Sitharaman, Coimbatore South BJP MLA Vanathi Srinivasan and Srinivasan seated in the room. The opposition had alleged that Srinivasan was forced to apologise and the video was made public by the BJP to humiliate him.
“On behalf of BJP Tamil Nadu, I sincerely apologise for the actions of our functionaries who shared a private conversation between a respected business owner and our Hon FM. I spoke with Thiru Srinivasan Avl, the esteemed owner of the Annapoorna chain of Restaurants, to express regret for this unintended breach of privacy,” Annamalai said, praising Srinivasan for contributing significantly to the state’s and nation’s economic growth.
The video of this close-door meeting was shared by Tamil Nadu BJP convenor Balaji MS. Balaji wrote that Srinivasan had apologised for the “indecent” speech.
On September 11, Nirmala Sitharaman met with industrialists and hoteliers in Coimbatore. Srinivasan highlighted the industry's grievances over GST inconsistencies and said that the Union government's practice of taxing each item differently had caused such confusion that "even the computers are unable to compute."
“The problem is that GST is applied differently to each item. For example: there is no GST on bun. If you put cream in it, GST becomes 18%. Because of this, customers say that they want bun and cream separately so that they can apply cream on the bun themselves to save money,” he said, leading to an eruption of laughter in the venue.
He continued, “People say that the FM has put 5% GST on sweets and 12% on namkeen because people eat a lot of sweets in the North. In Tamil Nadu, sweet, namkeen and coffee go together. Please charge uniform GST for these. The computer itself is getting stuck because of this GST confusion,” he shared nonchalantly. The meeting that caused the controversy seems to have happened a day after this incident.
Rahul Gandhi, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha and Congress leader, had criticised the BJP for showing arrogance and disrespect towards Srinivasan. “When the owner of a small business, like Annapoorna restaurant in Coimbatore, asks our public servants for a simplified GST regime, his request is met with arrogance and outright disrespect. Yet, when a billionaire friend seeks to bend the rules, change the laws, or acquire national assets, Modi Ji rolls out the red carpet.”
He further said that small business owners have already endured the blows of demonetisation, inaccessible banking system, tax extortion and GST. “The last thing they deserve is further humiliation. But when the fragile egos of those in power are hurt, it seems humiliation is exactly what they’ll deliver,” Rahul Gandhi added.