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Be prepared for fresh taxes, says PM

Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee Tuesday urged countrymen to be prepared for fresh taxes in the new budget.

Addressing a press conference in Lucknow on Tuesday evening, shortly after a tour of the earthquake-hit areas in Gujarat, Vajpayee said, "We have no choice but to introduce new taxes to meet the cost of reconstruction of large parts of the devastated state; people must be prepared for that."

He said, "Since the need had arisen solely on account of a natural calamity and not triggered off due to any policy of the government, I am sure people would not mind sharing the burden."

Asked if that was not avoidable since much assistance was also coming in from foreign nations, he replied, "Well, a large part of the foreign assistance will have to be returned."

Vajpayee also expressed the need for setting up a National Disaster Management Authority so that the administration can be better prepared to deal with such natural calamities.

"While it was easy to cope with a man-made disaster, it was not as simple to either handle or to scientifically predict a natural calamity like an earthquake," he added.

The prime minister declined to quote any definite figure with respect to the toll of human lives in Gujarat . "It is extremely difficult to say at this stage how many people have perished in the earthquake; the only correct method is by carrying out a head-count of the dead, but since no one knows how many more people are still buried in the debris it would not be proper to say anything in such definite terms," he pointed out.

When his attention was drawn to Defence Minister George Fernandes' statement that the estimated toll was 100,000, Vajpayee remarked, "Well that must be his personal estimate after undertaking an extensive tour of the entire quake-hit area, but I would still like to be absolutely certain before rolling out any statsitics; we must also take into account the large number of missing people."

Describing the Gujarat quake as the worst-ever tragedy in recent times, he confessed, "Even I could gather the real extent of the devastation only after driving through some of the quake-hit areas; that was not visible in the earlier aerial survey."

When a scribe sought to know if the Gujarat quake was likely to prompt the government to review its stand on going ahead with the Tehri Dam in Uttranchal which was also an earthquake-prone zone, Vajpayee said, "I do not see any connection between the two; after all the shocks of Gujarat were not even remotely felt up in the hills."

He went on to add, "In any case, earthquakes could occur anywhere and pose a threat to any dam."

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