Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray declined to accept Prime Minister Narendra Modi's prayer to reduce VAT on fuel prices. In a statement, Mr. Thackeray claimed that Centre owed 26,500 crore rupees to Maharashtra as GST arrears. This, the Chief Minister claimed, was despite the fact that Maharashtra's contribution in direct taxes is 38.3 percent and its share in the GST collection is 15 percent. He said Maharashtra is number one state in the country in terms of direct taxes and GST combined.<br />''  <br />'' Asserting that the state was not responsible for higher fuel prices in Mumbai, Thackeray said the share of taxes on diesel per litre comes to about 24.38 for Centre and 22.37 for state. He further said that for petrol, the Centre share of taxes stands at 31.58 per litre while the state gets 32.55 rupees. Mr. Thackeray said that Maharashtra has reduced VAT on natural gas from 13.5 to 3 percent to ease the citizens' difficulties.