(02/04/18) New Delhi: Petrol price on Sunday hit a four-year high of Rs 73.73 a Litre while diesel rates touched an all-time high of Rs 64.58 in the national capital, renewing calls for the government to cut excise tax rates. The Oil Ministry had earlier this year sought a reduction in excise duty on petrol and diesel to minimize the impact rising international oil rates but Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in his Budget presented on February1 ignored those calls.
On Monday, Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan took aim at states and said Petrol should be brought under GST”, Attending the launch of BS VI compliant automotive fuels in NCT Delhi. The Petroleum Minister, Introduced BSVI compliant fuel which will help the capital city to lower the alarming levels of air pollution and is a step forward in providing sustainable solutions towards a cleaner & healthier future.
India’s vehicle emission standards are modelled on the Euro emission standards that define limits for harmful exhaust emissions. The emission standards are primarily focused on the reduction of nitrogen oxides (NOx), carbon monoxide (CO), hydrocarbons (HC) and particulate matter (PM) emissions. As per the Indian government’s original roadmap, BS-IV (the equivalent of Euro-IV) was to be implemented across the country by April 1, 2017, BS-V in 2019 and BS-VI in 2023. While the scheduled roll-out of emission standards put India a few years behind Europe, it did allow ample time for Indian vehicle makers and, equally importantly, fuel suppliers to upgrade and be ready to meet the requirement.
Addressing the Gathering, the Petroleum Minister said, “This is the kind of drastic measure that is required, given the scale of the crisis. We cannot anymore work with small and incremental steps to bring us the kind of air quality benefits that we need. We will not pass through costs of up-gradation to BS VI fuels to consumers right now. We will want to pass costs to consumers post nationwide roll-out from April 1, 2020.”
Speaking about the Petrol Hike, Union Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said “we are trying to bring petrol and diesel under the purview of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).”
