Fuel prices unchanged for 6th day, petrol at record ₹120 in Mumbai | Check prices

Fuel prices remained unchanged across India for a sixth consecutive day on Tuesday, with the price of petrol in national capital Delhi at ₹105.41 per litre. In the country’s financial capital Mumbai, petrol prices are at a record ₹120.51 per litre with diesel at ₹104.77 per litre.

Petrol price in Indian metro cities and state capitals on April 12, 2022 (Source: goodreturns)

Fuel – petrol, diesel and gas – prices may be unchanged now for six days but they skyrocketed in the days following the BJP’s win in four Assembly elections in February-March.

Prior to that prices had remained unchanged since November last year, and that was after weeks of steady increases last year. Opposition leaders called out the patten of holding fuel prices steady before and during elections, and hiking them after results were announced.

Petrol and diesel prices were last hiked by 80 paise a litre last Wednesday, taking the total increase in rates in 16 days to ₹10 per litre.

Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri told the Lok Sabha last week the hikes are linked to a surge in international crude oil prices caused by the Ukraine war. “We are not the only country impacted by the war,” ANI quoted him as saying. “The surge in fuel prices in India is 1/10th of the price hike in other countries. The prices in the US, UK, France, Germany and Spain have increased by 51 per cent, but in India the hike is merely 5 per cent,” Puri added.

Previously, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman also underlined a link between the price of fuel in the international market and the outbreak of the war.

Despite the ministers’ attempted explanations the government has faced significant backlash from opposition parties over the surge in fuel prices. Congress leaders have accused the BJP-led government at the centre of ‘tax-gouging’, ‘torturing the public’ and ‘profiteering’, while MPs from the Shiv Sena, the Trinamool, and other political outfits have attacked the government for ‘filling their coffers’.

India is 85 per cent dependent on imports for meeting its oil needs, PTI reported. Russia’s Ukraine invasion and escalating sanctions have hampered oil flows across the globe. Brent crude hovered around $99 per barrel on Saturday as per marketwatch.com, following a sharp decline after hitting an all-time high in the previous weeks.