The central minister for Petroleum, Dharmendra Pradhan had a recent meeting with the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Finance Minister Arun Jaitley regarding the recent increasing trend of the petrol/diesel prices. He also had discussions on the topics of the international crude oil price fluctuations and the exchange rate of Indian Rupee with the US dollar.
It is gathered the meeting had a review regarding the alleviation of hardships and discontent of the public about the rising petrol/diesel prices.
It is also understood that the topics of reduction in production tax for petrol and diesel. As the Indian Rupee nears the exchange of Rs. 74 per US dollar, the Prime Minister had also discussed how this would affect the imports.
The price of the crude oil in the international market has been rising for the last few months and has reached an unprecedented high price in the last 4 years – it has touched the US $ 86. The Sensex has been greatly affected and recorded a fall by 700 points caused by the trend of depreciation of Indian Rupee as well the rise in the international crude oil price. So, the news was revealed that some important decision might have been taken during this meeting regarding the reduction in price.
The Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, after the meeting, had a session with the reporters informed that the Kalal Tax has been reduced by Rs. 1.50 per litre. Further, the oil corporations will now sell petrol and diesel at Rs. 1.00 lesser per litre. So, there is a possibility of a total reduction of Rs. 2.50 per litre for petrol and diesel. The central government has written to the state governments to reduce these prices by Rs. 2.50 per litre.
As the Kalal Tax has been reduced by Rs. 1.50 per litre, the central government will incur a loss of up to Rs. 1000 Crores.