(PTI)
The government on Saturday hiked excise duty on petrol and diesel by a steep Rs 3 per litre each to garner about Rs 39,000 crore additional revenue as it repeated its 2014-15 act of not passing on gains arising from slump in international oil prices.
Retail prices of petrol and diesel will not be impacted by the tax changes as state-owned oil firms adjusted them against the recent fall in oil prices and the likely trend in the near future, industry officials said.According to a notification issued by the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs, special excise duty on petrol was hiked by Rs 2 to Rs 8 per litre in case of petrol and to Rs 4 a litre from Rs 2 in case of diesel.
Additionally, road cess was raised by Re 1 per litre each on petrol and diesel to Rs 10.With this, the total incidence of excise duty on petrol has risen to Rs 22.98 per litre and that on diesel to Rs 18.83.The tax on petrol was Rs 9.48 per litre when the Modi government took office in 2014 and that on diesel was Rs 3.56 a litre.Officials said the increase in excise duty will result in annual increase of government revenues by about Rs 39,000 crore. The gains during the remaining three weeks of the current fiscal would be less than Rs 2,000 crore.
