As we predicted a few weeks ago, the price of petrol has been hiked - but even we were surprised at the amount of the hike. The government has raised the price of petrol by Rs 6.28 from midnight tonight. That translates to approximately a hike of Rs 7.5 after state taxes are added to the hike.
The reason for the price hike is a combination of the price of crude rising and the Rupee falling against the Dollar, which have made oil imports costly. Pranab Mukherjee, the Finance Minister, had asked the state governments to help reduce the burden on the consumer by cutting back on state-level taxes, but only the state of Goa has followed this by cutting VAT from the price of petrol.
The price of diesel, kerosene and LPG remains the same, which means that it is up to petrol alone to help reduce the burden of their subsidy.
