Petrol and diesel prices on Thursday neared record levels across the country after rates were hiked by 25 paise and 30 paise a litre respectively.
The price of petrol was hiked to Rs 101.64 a litre in Delhi and to Rs 107.71 per litre in Mumbai, according to a price notification of state-owned fuel retailers.
Diesel rates increased to Rs 89.87 a litre in Delhi and Rs 97.52 in Mumbai. Prices differ from state to state depending on the incidence of local taxes.
This is the second price increase in petrol since the ending of a three-week-long hiatus in rate revision and the fifth in the case of diesel.
The hike took the retail price of petrol to a near-record high. Petrol had hit a record high of Rs 101.84 a litre in Delhi in July and Rs 107.83 in Mumbai. For diesel, the increase led to rates equalling the all-time high of Rs 89.87 a litre touched in Delhi in the same month.
International oil prices are at three years high with global benchmark Brent trading at USD 78.64 per barrel.
This spurt in global rates led state-owned Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) to resume daily price revisions on September 24, ending the pause in rates that came into effect from September 5.
In five price increases since September 24, diesel rates have gone up by 1.25 paise per litre, negating all of the price reductions that happened between July 18 and September 5.
Petrol price has increased by 50 paise per litre in two instalments this week.
(With inputs from PTI)
