Yet another hike in fuel prices
After two days of lull, petrol and diesel price on Thursday was again hiked by 35 paise per litre, sending retail pump prices to their highest ever level across the country.
The price hike of petrol in Delhi rose to its highest-ever level of Rs 104.79 a litre and Rs 110.75 per litre in Mumbai, according to a price notification of state-owned fuel retailers.
In Mumbai, diesel now comes for Rs 101.40 a litre; while in Delhi, it costs Rs 93.52. This is the 13th time that petrol price has been hiked in two weeks while diesel rates have gone up on 16 times in three weeks. There was no change in rates on October 12 and 13.
While petrol price in most of the country is already above Rs 100-a-litre mark, diesel rates have crossed that level in a dozen states including Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Chattisgarh, Bihar, Kerala, Karnataka and Leh.
Prices differ from state to state depending on the incidence of local taxes. Shedding the modest price change policy, state-owned fuel retailers have since October 6 started passing on the larger incidence of cost to consumers.
This is because the international benchmark Brent crude has jumped to near USD 84 per barrel for the first time in seven years. On September 13, Brent was trading at USD 73.51. Being a net importer of oil, India prices petrol and diesel at rates equivalent to international prices.
The hike in international oil prices ended a three-week hiatus in rates on September 28 for petrol and September 24 for diesel.
Since then, diesel rates have gone up by Rs 4.9 per litre and petrol price has increased by Rs 3.9. Prior to that, the petrol price was increased by Rs 11.44 a litre between May 4 and July 17. Diesel rate had gone up by Rs 9.14 during
this period.
