The Kochi Corporation has decided to give a 25 per cent exemption on
entertainment tax for the One-Day International between India and West
Indies that will be held in Kochi on November 21.

The decision in this regard was taken at the all-party meet convened by mayor Tony Chammany here on Tuesday.

“Considering
the severe  financial crunch that the Kochi Corporation is facing, the
all-party meet had initially decided not to approve the request of the
Kerala Cricket Association (KCA) for a tax exemption.

“However,
later the leaders reached on a consensus to give a 25 per cent exemption
on entertainment tax. In order to give the advantage of tax exemption 
to the general public, we will ask the Kerala Cricket Association to
reduce the price of ordinary tickets for the match,” said  Tony
Chammany. For the match between India and Australia that was washed out
in the rain in 2010, the KCA had given a sum of `64 lakh as
entertainment tax to the Corporation.

 However, the match was
abandoned and KCA refunded the amount of tickets sold. They also asked
the Corporation to repay the entertainment tax collected for the
abandoned match.

Though the Corporation had convened a special
council meeting to decide on the refund, it failed to reach a decision
in this regard.

Following this, KCA again asked the Corporation to carry forward the amount that it already paid for the next match.

However
that demand was not met and KCA again paid Rs 51 lakh as entertainment
tax for the match between India and England that was played at Kaloor
stadium in January.