No plan yet to raise fuel prices: Oil Min

PTI

New Delhi

State-owned fuel retailers are incurring losses of about ₹20 per litre on petrol and roughly ₹100 per litre on diesel as pump prices remain frozen for nearly four years despite a surge in global oil prices, the government said on Thursday, signalling there is no immediate plan to raise retail fuel rates.

Dismissing reports of a potential ₹25-28 per litre increase in petrol and diesel prices after assembly elections, the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG) said in a post on X that "there is no such proposal under consideration by the government".

At a news briefing on developments in West Asia, Sujata Sharma, Joint Secretary in the petroleum ministry, said international prices of crude oil and LPG rates have been very volatile, yet the government has not increased prices.

Crude which was $70 per barrel last year, averaged over $113 this month, Sharma said. "There is a huge increase... inspite of that the government has not increased prices and the effort of the government has been to keep the prices stable." 

Retail petrol and diesel prices have remained frozen since early April 2022 — a period during which oil prices rose in some months and fell in other times. When prices fell, state-owned oil firms made handsome profits, which they used to set off losses when rates rose.