Amid rising prices every day, any minister who comes to the petroleum ministry, his biggest challenge will be to control the price. Government oil companies have continued the process of increasing the prices of petrol and diesel on Thursday, the day of Hardeep Singh Puri taking charge of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas. Not only this, the prices of piped gas (PNG) in the kitchen and CNG used in vehicles have also been increased.
It is believed that the experience of Hardeep Puri, who has been an ambassador to many countries, will prove to be very useful when talks are taking place with many countries regarding the prices of crude oil and gas in the international market. State-owned oil companies on Thursday increased the prices of petrol and diesel for the 62nd this year. Petrol has crossed Rs 100 in all the metros of the country including Mumbai, Delhi.
Diesel is also selling above Rs 100 per liter in many states. After Thursday's hike, the price of petrol in Delhi has gone up to Rs 100.56 per liter and diesel to Rs 89.62 per liter. However, after reaching the Petroleum Ministry, he refrained from giving a clear answer to this question, saying that increasing crude oil and gas production in the country would be an important priority for him.
Puri is a 1974 batch IFS officer. One of the reasons behind giving Puri the Petroleum Ministry charges that he will prove to be a better rapporteur with energy partners such as the US and Russia, apart from oil-producing countries. In the year 2015, in the Urja Sangam program, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had set a target of a five percent reduction in dependence on imported oil by the year 2020, but during this period India's dependence on imported crude has increased to 85 percent.
In such a situation, Puri will have to show his efficiency in bringing cheap crude from the world. The biggest challenge of Puri will be to rein in one way or the other the increase in petroleum products almost every other day. This will happen only if he can persuade Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to cut central excise duty or convince state governments to cut VAT rates.