Shehzad Poonawalla, a leader within the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), expressed concerns about the financial pressures facing India’s middle class. He questioned whether taxpayers are receiving public services that justify the taxes they contribute. This statement came just one day before he announced his resignation as a party spokesperson.
Poonawalla’s remarks came a day before he put out a statement saying he had resigned as a BJP spokesperson, with his resignation pending approval. “The Indian middle class is being looted in broad daylight. “They pay taxes, tolls, and what do they get in return?
He said he had submitted his resignation on July 30 and cited a focus on his financial circumstances as one of the reasons for the decision.
In a video posted on Instagram as part of his social media initiative, ‘The Manifesto’, Poonawalla said the middle class had effectively become an “ATM” for the government, paying income tax, indirect taxes and tolls without receiving adequate public services in return. He has become like an ATM,” Poonawalla said. Bad roads outside your house, bad schools, bad crumbling infrastructure, paper leaks, corruption, lack of accountability, toxic air, toxic water,” he said. Poonawalla said the issue was not limited to any one government or political party, arguing that Indian taxpayers and the middle class had faced the problem since Independence. “Tax slabs need to be increased,” Poonawalla said, adding that the government must ensure that “every rupee of personal income tax that the taxpayer pays is efficiently used.”
