Petrol price at record high on Tuesday in Delhi
Transportation fuel prices continued with their upward trend, with oil marketing companies (OMCs) on Tuesday again raising petrol and diesel prices by 35 paise a litre each in the National Capital Region (NCR).
The pump retail prices of petrol hit a new record high of Rs87.30 per litre in Delhi. Diesel prices retailed at Rs77.48 a litre in the national capital. In Mumbai also, petrol and diesel sold at a record high at Rs93.83 a litre and Rs84.36 a litre respectively.
Diesel had touched an all-time high of Rs81.94 a litre on 30 July in the capital. Having held rates steady for 29 days, OMCs had been increasing auto fuel prices since early January.
This comes against the backdrop of benchmark Brent crude trading at $61.03 per barrel in early trades on Tuesday, and the West Texas Intermediate was at $56.69 a barrel, at the time of writing this story. The cost of the Indian basket of crude, which comprises Oman, Dubai and Brent crude, was at $59.15 a barrel on 5 February.
Global crude oil prices have been rallying after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec)-plus meeting on 3 February decided to continue with supply curbs. The decision is significant for India, the third-largest oil importer globally, as Opec makes up for about 40% of global output and 83% of India’s oil imports.
India has expressed its displeasure to Opec for ‘backtracking’ on its commitments. India has been making a case for affordable oil prices, given that it is particularly vulnerable since any increase in global prices can affect its import bill, stoke inflation and increase its trade deficit.
Every dollar increase in the price of oil raises India’s import bill by Rs10,700 crore on an annualized basis. India spent $101.4 billion on crude oil imports in 2019-20 and $111.9 billion in 2018-19.
