ISLAMABAD: The government on Monday decided to pass the partial reduction in prices of international POL products on to the consumers effective from New Year 2019.
The decision of reducing the prices of petroleum products has been taken for the month of January 2019, the Ministry of Finance said in a statement, adding that prices of petrol and diesel had been reduced by Rs4.86 and Rs4.26 per litre, respectively.
The price of kerosene oil has also been decreased by 52 paisas and that of LDO by Rs2.16 per litre.
The price of petrol has been brought down from Rs95.83 to Rs90.97 per litre, high speed diesel Rs110.94 to Rs106.68 per litre, kerosene oil Rs83.50 to Rs82.98 per litre and light diesel oil (LDO) Rs77.44 to Rs75.28 per litre.
In a summary moved to the Petroleum Division on Friday last week, the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) had recommended that the prices of petrol may be reduced by Rs9.50 per litre (10%), high speed diesel (HSD) by Rs15 per litre (13.5%), kerosene oil by 25 paisas and LDO by Rs2 per litre for the month of January 2019
The high speed diesel is used in agriculture and transport sectors and therefore, partial reduction in the price of this product would also lead to providing some relief to the consumers. Petrol is used in vehicles and motorists and reduction in its price would also result in providing some relief. However, the consumers had been deprived of major cut in prices of petrol and high speed diesel.
For month of December 2018, the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) increased sales tax on diesel from 12% to 13% while for petrol it was increased from 4.5% to 8%. However, the sales tax on petrol is still low as compared to the standard rate of sales tax which is 17%. Officials said that government had now increased the taxes on petrol and high speed diesel to adjust the reduction in prices that resulted in partial cut in oil prices to the consumers.
