Petrol, diesel to cost more

Resorting to the fifth increase since June-beginning, public sector oil firms hiked petrol prices by Re 0.70 per litre from Wednesday-Thursday midnight. Diesel prices too moved up by Rs 0.50 per litre. The price increase excludes VAT or local taxes.

After the hike, petrol prices for Bangalore will be Rs 78.12 per litre, in NewDelhi Rs.71.28, in Kolkata Rs 78.64, Mumbai Rs 78.61 and Chennai Rs 74.49.

A sharp fall in the value of the rupee has made oil imports costlier and put pressure on the marketing firms as they supply diesel at subsidised rates. OMCs review petrol and diesel prices once every two weeks.

“Since the last price change, the international price of petrol has gone up from $117.19 per barrel to $120.05. The INR-USD exchange rate, however, has marginally appreciated from Rs 60.03 to a US dollar to Rs 59.49,” said India’s largest fuel retailer IOC in a statement.

Two other state-run fuel retailers — Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum — are expected to follow suit as they tend to move their prices together. IOC also said it would end the fiscal with a revenue loss of Rs 1.29 lakh crore on sale of diesel, domestic cooking gas (LPG) and kerosene.

The basic diesel prices were hiked by Re 0.50, but the actual hike after adding VAT would be only Re 0.10 in Bangalore, and the price will go up to Rs 55.49 per litre. An IOC official in Bangalore clarified that although the actual hike was Re 0.50, the effective hike would be only Re 0.10 because a reduction in sales tax is coming into effect from Thursday.