Petrol, diesel prices rally to highest ever levels

Petrol and diesel prices on Friday rallied to their highest ever levels across the country, as fuel rates were hiked again by 35 paise a litre.

The price of petrol in Delhi rose to its highest-ever level of ₹105.14 a litre and ₹111.09 per litre in Mumbai, according to a price notification of state-owned fuel retailers.

In Mumbai, diesel now comes for ₹101.78 a litre; while in Delhi, it costs ₹93.87.

This is the second straight day of 35 paise per litre increase in petrol and diesel prices. There was no change in rates on October 12 and 13.

Since the ending of a three-week-long hiatus in rate revision in the last week of September, this is the 14th increase in petrol price and the 17th time that diesel rates have gone up.

While petrol price in most of the country is already above ₹100-a-litre mark, diesel rates have crossed that level in a dozen states, including Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Kerala, Karnataka and Leh.

Prices differ from State to State depending on the incidence of local taxes.

Shedding the modest price change policy, state-owned fuel retailers have since October 6 started passing on the larger incidence of cost to consumers.

This is because the international benchmark Brent crude is trading at $84.61 per barrel for the first time in seven years.

A month back, Brent was trading at $73.51.

Being a net importer of oil, India prices petrol and diesel at rates equivalent to international prices.

The surge in international oil prices ended a three-week hiatus in rates on September 28 for petrol and September 24 for diesel.

Since then, diesel rates have gone up by ₹5.25 per litre and petrol price has increased by ₹4.25.

Before that, the petrol price was increased by ₹11.44 a litre between May 4 and July 17. Diesel rate had gone up by ₹9.14 during this period.