Petrol and diesel prices continued to steadily inch upward for the sixth consecutive day on Friday. After the latest hikes, petrol sold at ₹74.57 a litre while diesel retailed at ₹72.81 a litre in the national capital, an IndianOil price notification said.

The price of petrol was raised by 57 paise a litre while diesel price was raised by 59 paise per litre. This takes the total hike in petrol price to ₹3.31 a litre and the hike in diesel price to ₹3.42 a litre over six days.

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The daily revision of petrol and diesel prices had resumed after a nearly three-month hiatus that coincided with the Covid-19 lockdowns in the country.

Domestic auto fuel prices are benchmarked to the global sale price of similar grades of fuel. With the demand for petrol and diesel plummeting across the word, petroleum product prices had also taken a hit.

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To take advantage of the situation, the centre had hiked the excise duty on petrol by ₹10 per litre and on diesel by ₹13 a litre on May 5. Oil marketing companies absorbed these duty hikes, and the retail prices of auto fuels had not been increased in tandem with the excise hikes.

But with demand for petrol products returning, the benchmark global prices have also firmed up. This has led to the cost of these fuels increasing in India.

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