Retail price of CNG, PNG likely to go up substantially

However, the government hopes that the entire impact of the over two-fold hike in natural gas, which is the basic input of CNG — used as popular auto fuel —  and PNG —  increasingly being used as pollution-free cooking fuel in select cities of the country — will not be passed on to consumers.

“We sincerely hope that the CNG and PNG retailing firms will not pass on the entire burden to consumers with the increase in input costs. However, the exact quantum of hike in retail prices of these products will be decided by the concerned gas marketing firms,” said Petroleum Secretary S Sundareshan. 

Currently CNG and PNG are marketed in select cities, including Delhi and Mumbai, by the state-owned gas transportation and marketing firm GAIL through its subsidiaries.
CNG in New Delhi costs Rs 21.90 per kg and Rs 24.65 in Mumbai while PNG costs Rs 16.5 per unit in Delhi and Rs 13.7 in Mumbai.

Statutory charges
Industry sources say as the basic prices of CNG and PNG are all set to go up with the doubling of the APM gas price, there will be corresponding hike in taxes and other statutory charges.

The pricing of natural gas produced by the ONGC and OIL from nominated blocks is normally fixed by the government through APM.ONGC and OIL normally sell natural gas at the APM price to government-selected power, fertiliser and city gas projects.