Centre cuts excise duty on petrol, diesel; prices to drop by ₹9.5, ₹7 per litre

The Centre has decided to reduce the central excise duty on petrol by ₹8 per litre and on diesel by ₹6 per litre, Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Saturday.

The move will reduce the price of petrol by ₹9.5 per litre and of diesel by ₹7 per litre, she added. “It will have a revenue implication of around ₹1 lakh crore per year for the government,” the finance minister said in a series of tweets.

Sitharaman also urged state governments to implement a similar cut.

“I wish to exhort all state governments, especially the states where the reduction wasn’t done during the last round (November 2021), to also implement a similar cut and give relief to the common man,” she tweeted.

The move comes on the day the price of CNG in the national capital was hiked by ₹2 per kg – the 13th increase in rates in just over two months. CNG in the national capital territory of Delhi now costs ₹75.61 per kg, up from ₹73.61 per kg, according to the information posted on the website of Indraprastha Gas Ltd (IGL) – the firm which retails CNG and piped cooking gas in the national capital and adjoining cities.

Mahanagar Gas Limited (MGL) has priced Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) at ₹76 per kg in Mumbai. Prices vary from city to city depending on the incidence of local taxes such as VAT.

Sitharaman also announced that the Centre will give a subsidy of ₹200 per gas cylinder (up to 12 cylinders) to over nine crore beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana. “This will help our mothers and sisters. This will have a revenue implication of around ₹6,100 crore a year,” she added.

“We are also reducing the customs duty on raw materials & intermediaries for plastic products where our import dependence is high. This will result in reduction of cost of final products,” she tweeted.

Extending further relief to farmers, Sitharaman said, “In addition to the fertiliser subsidy of ₹1.05 lakh crore in the budget, an additional amount of ₹1.10 lakh crore is being provided to further cushion our farmers.”

“Despite rising fertiliser prices globally, we have protected our farmers from such price hikes,” she said.

“Similarly, we are calibrating customs duty on raw materials & intermediaries for iron & steel to reduce their prices. Import duty on some raw materials of steel will be reduced. Export duty on some steel products will be levied,” the minister said.