Centre Reduces Central Excise duty on Petrol by 8 paise per litre and Diesel by 6 paise by litre

Nirmala Sitharaman, the Finance Minister, announced on Saturday that the Centre has agreed to lower excise duty on petrol by Rs 8 per litre and on diesel by Rs 6 per litre to avoid fuel price hikes that were forced by the rise in international oil prices. She estimates that the move will cost the government roughly Rs 1 trillion in revenue.

"We are reducing the Central excise duty on Petrol by ₹ 8 per litre and on Diesel by ₹ 6 per litre. This will reduce the price of petrol by ₹ 9.5 per litre and of Diesel by ₹ 7 per litre. It will have revenue implication of around ₹ 1 lakh crore/year for the government”, Sitharaman wrote in her Twitter account.

"I wish to exhort all state governments, especially the states where reduction wasn’t done during the last round (November 2021), to also implement a similar cut and give relief to the common man," said Sitharaman.

PM Narendra Modi has directed all government agencies to act with compassion and provide relief to the ordinary man. We are announcing more efforts to help our people in keeping with Prime Minister Modi's promise to help the poor and common man, she said.

Over 90 million beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana will receive a subsidy of Rs 200 each gas cylinder (up to 12 cylinders), according to Sitharaman. This will result in annual revenue of roughly Rs 6,100 crore.