State-level meeting of Punjab Pradesh Beopar Mandal held 

Ludhiana, January 10: A state-level meeting of Punjab Pradesh Beopar Mandal (PPBM) held here today. It was held under the leadership of district president Arwinder Singh Makkar,chairman Pawan Lehar and state general secretary Sunil Mehra. Dr Kamal Soi from the Akhil Bhartiya Vyapar Mandal, Gurdeep Singh Gosha from the Youth Akali Dal, Harkesh Mittal from CAIT Punjab and Rakesh Kapoor President Punjab Vyapar Prakoshth were especially present at the meeting. 

The meeting discussed about “anti-trade” policies of the government. It was attended by the representatives of various associations of the city. 

Speakers condemned a move of the state government to increase power tariff by eight percent in Punjab. It was warned to stage a wide-spread protest across the state if this hike was brought in. They recalled that the state government had promised to provide power at Rs.5 per unit.

The state government was also urged upon to implement one-time settlement policy as soon as possible to provide relief to old assessees of VAT. Speakers regretted that traders had been issued nearly 70,000 VAT notices to traders across the state. They said traders were united to agitate against highhandedness of the Amarinder Government. 

The meeting, among other things demanded simplification of GST procedures in the larger interests of the traders, action against corrupt departmental officials.  

On the occasion, the representatives of various mandals were announced to form a team of one lakh members of Punjab Pradesh Beopar Mandal, these representatives included Lalit Garg (South), Kamal Gupta (Atam Nagar), Baljit Singh (Central), Rakesh Dhawan (North), Banwari harjai (West), Gopal Bhandari (Sarafa Bazar), Ramesh Mahajan, Pawan Malhotra (hosiery industry).