VAT on pvt edn institutions discriminatory: BNP

BNP described on Sunday the government move to impose 7.5 per cent value added tax (VAT) on private higher educational institutions as anti-people and discriminatory, and urged the prime minister to withdraw it for the sake of country's poor and middle-class people, reports UNB.
"Students of private higher educational institutions will have to pay 7.5 per cent VAT at every step. When education is recognised as a constitutional right, the imposition of VAT on the private educational institution is the government's anti-people move," said BNP spokesman Asaduzzaman Ripon.
He further said, "It's a discriminatory system when a group of students will study at a minimum cost in public educational institutions while many others do the same in private institutions with huge expenditure paying VAT. We're against such system."
While speaking at a press conference at the BNP Nayapaltan central office, Ripon alleged that the government is promoting turning the education into a commercial commodity and educational institutions into commercial ones. "Our party wants education not to be made a means to earn money."
He said it is the responsibility of the state to ensure education for all students of the country. "The students are being forced to study in private educational institutions as the public institutions can't accommodate them. So, there's no logic behind imposing VAT on the private institutions. We protest the government's decision."
The BNP leader also urged the government to give the nation an explanation as to why they have imposed the VAT on the students of the poor and middle-income families which may put their education at stake.
"We call upon the prime minister to consider the withdrawal of the 7.5 per cent VAT on the educational institutions on humanitarian grounds in the interests of the country's poor and middle-income people," he added.