1 Petrol price cut by Re 1/litre ~ "TAKE NO AS A QUESTION "

Tuesday 2 April 2013

Petrol price cut by Re 1/litre

Petrol price cut by Re 1/litre

NEW DELHI: State-run fuel retailers on Monday decided to pare petrol price by 85 paise a litre, excluding local levies, to pass on to consumers the benefit of falling international rates. The second reduction in as many weeks would take effect from intervening midnight of Monday and Tuesday.

After including VAT, or local levies, the reduction in Delhi would be Rs 1 a litre and the petrol would cost Rs 67.29 per litre against Rs 68.34. In Mumbai, the fuel would cost Rs 1.07 less at Rs 74.14 per litre. In Kolkata, the price has been cut by an equal measure to Rs 74.72. It will cost Rs 70.34 a litre in Chennai against Rs 71.42 at present.

The price cut comes on back of the Rs 2 a litre reduction in rates effected on March 16. This was the steepest cut in rates in nine months, which after including VAT, resulted in a reduction of Rs 2.40 a litre.

Announcing the reduction, Indian Oil Corp (IOC), the nation's largest fuel retailer, said since the last price change international prices of petrol have declined from $122.74 per barrel to $119.23 a barrel. Also, the rupee-dollar exchange rate has marginally declined from Rs 54.40 to a US dollar to Rs 54.28.

The cut in petrol price follows two rounds of hike in rates since February. Petrol price was hiked by Rs 1.50 a litre on February 16 and then by Rs 1.40 per litre from March 2. Both the increases were excluding local VAT.

Oil firms calculate the retail price on 1st and 16th of every month, based on average imported oil price on the previous fortnight. The price change was to have been announced on March 31, but was deferred because of being a Sunday.

Though petrol price had been deregulated in June 2010, they have rarely moved in tandem with cost. This resulted in Rs 500 crore loss to IOC (Rs 1,150 crore loss to state fuel retailers) during 2012-13.

However, since January, when the government decided to cut subsidizes by asking oil firms to moderate prices in step with cost, petrol prices have moved in tune with cost.

Diesel prices continue to be regulated, but the government had in January authorized oil firms to hike their rates by 40-50 paise per litre every month till such time that the entire revenue loss on the fuel is completely wiped off.

Oil firms raised diesel prices by 50-51 paise per litre on three occasions since then.

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