Comments
The petroleum sector’s contribution to the government’s exchequer stood at ₹3.57-lakh crore in H1 FY23, of which the Centre’s share was around ₹1.97-lakh crore, while the share of the State governments stood at ₹1.60-lakh crore, Parliament was informed on Monday.
The data provided by the Minister of State for Petroleum & Natural Gas Rameswar Teli as part of a written response to a query in the Rajya Sabha showed that in FY22, the oil and gas sector contributed ₹4.92-lakh crore to the central exchequer, while States got ₹2.82-lakh crore.
Total contribution
Similarly, the total contribution to government exchequer stood at ₹6.73-lakh crore, of which the Centre’s share was ₹4.55-lakh crore, and States received ₹2.18-lakh crore from the petroleum sector.
On reduction in cess and surcharge on auto fuels, the Minister said: “The government takes into account all relevant factors and makes interventions by way of calibrating excise duty rates on petrol and diesel as and when required.”
The government, with effect from November 4, 2021, reduced Central Excise Duty (Road and Infrastructure cess) on petrol by ₹5 per litre and on diesel by ₹10 per litre. On May 21 also it reduced the Central Excise Duty (Road and Infrastructure cess) on petrol by ₹8 per litre and on diesel by ₹6 a litre, he added.
International prices
In a separate question in the Rajya Sabha on government passing the benefit of softening crude oil prices to the consumers, Teli said while the average price of Indian basket of crude oil increased by 102 per cent (from $43.34 to $87.55 a barrel) between November 2020 and November 2022, the retail prices of petrol and diesel have increased in India by only 18.95 per cent and 26.5 per cent, respectively.
“Prices of LPG in the country are based on Saudi Contract Price (CP), the benchmark for international prices of LPG. During the period from April 2020 to April 2022, the international prices of LPG increased by around 300 per cent. However, to insulate consumers from fluctuations in international LPG prices, the cost increase was not fully passed on to consumers of domestic LPG,” he added.
Accordingly, domestic LPG prices have risen by only 72 per cent during this period. This has led to significant losses for these oil marketing companies (OMCs). To compensate for these losses, the government has recently approved a one-time compensation of ₹22,000 crore to OMCs, the Minister said.
Comments
COMMENT NOW
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.