Amid a higher inflationary trend, rising prices of vehicles and expensive loans, any further rise in excise duty on automobiles will hurt buying sentiments, Bajaj Auto Chairman Rahul Bajaj has warned.
“Reducing the excise duty on vehicles was a very correct step by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee two years ago. The rate only started clawing back last Budget. I do not know whether the duty will go up fully to its earlier level or partially or not at all. But from the industry’s point of view, the lesser the increase the better it is,” Bajaj said on Tuesday on the sidelines of a corporate governance summit.
‘People like Ramalinga Raju have shamed us’
“If the top management of a company is corrupt and doing wrong, the shareholders and its customers would leave the company. The one who is a crook will find a way to defraud despite regulations. Excessive regulation, more than preventing corruption, only ends up stifling those doing business honestly,” Bajaj added.
“It was not possible to carry out a fraud like Satyam with the auditors not knowing about it for such a long time. People like Ramalinga Raju and senior executives at PwC have shamed us. I am not prepared to believe that they were not guilty,” he said.