Nation Building!!

 

This habit of writing down income and expenses daily, I inherited from my father. While my father used a plain diary, I use an Excel sheet. Over years this Excel sheet has grown from a simple list of items to a workbook to give detailed split up to the last Rupee reconciling with my bank statements and investments. So exactly on 31^st March, my personal Balance Sheet is ready.

For FY 2020-21, out of my total earnings, 30% was deducted by Nirmala Ma’am, our honorable FM as Income tax. I spent about 70% of the balance 70%, on petrol, vacation, dress, son’s education, insurance premium and other living expenses. The rest are my personal savings.

Obviously, different expenses fall under different GST brackets. Nearly two- thirds of my petrol expense is tax. In addition, considering the 18% GST paid on other expenses, my excel sheet tells me that 25% of total expenses was paid as tax. This means my total tax outgo is about 42% of my annual income which could go up to 45% including the tax on interest, dividend and investment income. My contribution to Nation Building!

 बोल वो रहे है, पर शब्द हमारे है. Though he is speaking, words are mine. Says the librarian to the dean during the Hindi speech by Chatur in the popular movie 3 Idiots. Whenever the prime minister of the day doles out thousands of crores into the accounts of the beneficiaries, or the chief ministers proudly waive off loans, I have the same feeling as the librarian. Though they are paying, the money is mine! But what the ‘Ranchos’ of the day has in store (बलात्कार of the tax payer!!) will be only known later. When my hard earned Maruti car is stopped on the way for a politician on an Audi to pass, I say to myself ‘All is well’ the Audi too is bought from my money for Nation building!

We are a developing country. We keep on developing. The same roads and bridges sequentially keep on developing. Storm water drains, cable laying, water supply, telephones, Metro and what not, keep on happening one after the other. Daily when I see people sleeping on foot paths, hungry children begging on the streets in a city where the world’s richest people live, I am reminded of my helplessness. I am reminded that all I can do is keep paying 45% of my earnings as tax. The ‘development’ is controlled by someone else.   

In typical Indian style, an uninvited guest or even a beggar is an embodiment of God. We say, the giver is blessed to have someone receive the alms from him. Lord Krishna says in the Bhagawad Gita, you only have the right to work but never to its fruits. Every time, the footpath is ‘rightfully’ occupied by vendors, the roads are dug perpetually, I have to pay a bribe, a politician roams around in a Fortuner, or the authorities squander money for nothing, I say to myself. I have the right only to pay taxes but never to its fruits!