Petrol prices today hit Rs 74.40 a litre - the highest level under the BJP-led government, while diesel rates touched a record high of Rs 65.65, renewing calls for cut in excise duty to ease the burden on consumers.

State-owned oil firms, which have been since June last year revising auto fuel prices daily, today raised the petrol and diesel rates by 19 paise per litre each in Delhi, according to a price notification.

The hike, necessitated due to rising international oil prices, comes on the back of a 13 paise increase in the rates of petrol effected yesterday and a 15 paise hike in diesel, the notification said.

Petrol in the national capital now costs Rs 74.40 a litre, the highest since September 14, 2013, when the rates had hit Rs 76.06. Diesel prices at Rs 65.65 are the highest ever.

The Oil Ministry had earlier this year sought a reduction in excise duty on petrol an diesel to cushion the impact of rising international oil rates but Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, in his Budget presented on February 1, had ignored those calls.

India has the highest retail prices of petrol and diesel among South Asian nations as taxes account for half of the pump rates.

Jaitley had raised the excise duty nine times between November 2014 and January 2016 to shore up its finances as global oil prices fell, but then cut the tax just once in October last year by Rs 2 a litre.

Subsequent to that excise duty reduction, the Centre had asked states to also lower VAT, but just four of them - Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh - reduced the rates while others, including BJP-ruled ones, ignored the call.

The Central Government had cut the excise duty by Rs 2 per litre in October 2017, when petrol prices reached Rs 70.88 per litre in Delhi and diesel Rs. 59.14. Because of the reduction in excise duty, diesel prices had on October 4, 2017 came down to Rs 56.89 per litre and petrol to Rs 68.38 per litre.

However, a global rally in crude prices pushed domestic fuel prices far higher than those levels. The excise duty cut in October cost the government Rs 26,000 crore in annual revenue and about Rs 13,000 crore during the remaining part of the current fiscal year.

The government had between November 2014 and January 2016 raised the excise duty on petrol and diesel on nine occasions to take away gains arising from plummeting global oil prices.

In all, duty on petrol rate was hiked by Rs 11.77 per litre and that on diesel by 13.47 a litre in those 15 months that helped the government’s excise mop up more than double to Rs 2,42,000 crore in 2016-17 from Rs 99,000 crore in 2014-15.

State-owned oil companies - Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation - had in June last year dumped the 15-year old practice of revising rates on the 1st and 16th of every month . Instead, they adopted a daily price revision system to instantly reflect changes in cost. Since then prices are revised on a daily basis.

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