The Centre has decided to reduce the central excise duty on petrol by Rs. 8 per litre and on diesel by Rs. 6 per litre, Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Saturday. The price of petrol will be reduced by Rs. 9.5 per litre and of diesel by Rs. 7 per litre, she added.
She tweeted, “I wish to exhort all state governments, especially the states where the reduction wasn’t done during the last round (November 2021), to also implement a similar cut and give relief to the common man.”
The government announced this news just a day after the price of CNG in Delhi was hiked by Rs. 2 per kg – the 13th increase in rates in just over two months. The cost of CNG in New Delhi is Rs. 75.61 per kg, up from Rs. 73.61 per kg, according to the information posted on the website of Indraprastha Gas Ltd (IGL) – the firm which retails CNG and piped cooking gas in the national capital and adjoining cities.
She further stated that centre is going to give a subsidy of Rs. 200 per gas cylinder (up to 12 cylinders) to over nine crore beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana. “This will help our mothers and sisters. This will have a revenue implication of around Rs. 6,100 crore a year,” she added.
She wrote, “We are also reducing the customs duty on raw materials & intermediaries for plastic products where our import dependence is high. This will result in the reduction of cost of final products.”
She also said, “In addition to the fertiliser subsidy of Rs. 1.05 lakh crore in the budget, an additional amount of Rs. 1.10 lakh crore is being provided to further cushion our farmers. Despite rising fertiliser prices globally, we have protected our farmers from such price hikes.”
Nirmala Sitharaman quoted, “Similarly, we are calibrating customs duty on raw materials & intermediaries for iron & steel to reduce their prices. Import duty on some raw materials of steel will be reduced. Export duty on some steel products will be levied.”