Petrol Prices At Record High, Mumbai Pays The Most: 10 Points

Since August 16, petrol prices have risen by over Rs 2 per litre to reach a record high.

New Delhi: Petrol and diesel are on a record high, less than four months after a hike that caused an uproar across the country. Mumbai is paying the most, with petrol at Rs 86.56 a litre and diesel at 75.54 litre. Petrol price in Delhi rose to a record Rs 79.15 a litre, Rs 8 more than the diesel, which is also at a record high. Oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan had attributed the sudden peak to the rise in international crude prices and devaluation of the rupee.

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"Such a situation has arisen due to the rise in crude oil price in international market and devaluation of Indian rupee against US Dollar. The government is concerned about it," Oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan has said.
Petrol prices in Delhi rose by 31 paise a litre on Monday, diesel by 39 paise a litre. This was the steepest spike since the daily revision of prices were introduced in June 2017. In Kolkata, petrol is at 82.06 a litre and in Chennai, it is 82.24 a litre.
The previous high was Rs 78.43 a litre on May 28. On that day, the rate in Mumbai was Rs 86.24 per litre.
Crude oil has gone up by 7 dollars a barrel over a fortnight, driven by fears that the US sanctions on Iran will shrink supplies.
Part of the steep rise is the result of the falling rupee - the exchange rate is now a record Rs 71 to a US dollar, down by Rs 2.50 in a month. Fuel prices have been on the rise since August 16 as the rupee dipped rapidly against the dollar.
The rupee to dollar rate has also pushed up the price of CNG (compressed natural gas) as well as piped natural gas (PNG) since the price of gas procured by city distributors is mostly dollar-denominated.
Since August 16, petrol prices have risen by over Rs 2 per litre. Diesel prices on the other hand have risen by Rs 2.42 a litre during this period.
Over the weekend, nearly 75,000 fishermen from coastal districts of Tamil Nadu did not go out to sea to condemn the rise in price of diesel, a representative of their association has said. They demanded that the taxes on petrol and diesel be brought under the Goods and Services Tax.
The current Value-Added Tax or VAT is 21 per cent in Mumbai, Navi Mumbai and Thane, the rest of Maharashtra pays 22 per cent. The price of fuel is marginally less in New Delhi state capitals because of the lower VAT.
In August, the opposition and various industry bodies had also demanded that fuel excise duties be reduced. But cutting on excise duties means revenue loss for the government. The other option is to ask the oil companies to bear the loss.