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Budget 2021: How will cess on petrol, diesel impact you?
“However, while applying this cess, we have taken care not to put additional burden on consumers on most items,” Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said while presenting the Union Budget of this year.
Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday announced an agriculture cess on petrol and diesel at ₹2.5 /litre and ₹4 /litre respectively. This addition by the Centre comes at a time when the prices of both fuels have been touching new heights with multiple surges this month. However, Sitharaman said that the Agriculture Infrastructure and Development Cess (AIDC) — which has been imposed on such as gold, silver and agricultural products apart from petrol and diesel — would not act as an additional burden on the consumer.
“However, while applying this cess, we have taken care not to put additional burden on consumers on most items,” she said while presenting the Union Budget of this year.
Following the imposition of this cess, the Basic Excise Duty (BED) and Special Additional Excise Duty (SAED) rates have been reduced on petrol and diesel so that consumers don’t have to face additional burden, according to news agency PTI. Non-branded petrol and diesel would attract BED of ₹1.4 /litre on petrol and ₹1.8 litre on diesel. The SAED on these fuels will be at ₹11 /litre and ₹8 /litre respectively. Similar changes have also been made for branded petrol and diesel.
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On January 23 (Saturday), petrol and diesel prices across India saw a fresh hike of ₹25 paise/litre each, as per a notification issued by oil marketing companies. Post this update, petrol prices in Delhi went up to 85.70 /litre and in Mumbai to ₹92.28. While the diesel prices in the national capital climbed to ₹75.88 /litre and ₹82.66 /litre in Mumbai.
Union oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan had earlier blamed the Saudi oil output cut for the surge in prices. “A few months back, we all were discussing consumption-centric revival, demand-driven revival, and we were supposed to restrict our production cut, and ramp-up (of production) gradually by January. But contrary to that, we all are controlling oil production (now),” Pradhan was quoted as saying by PTI.
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Meanwhile, today, the petrol prices in Delhi were at ₹86.30/litre after they crossed the ₹86/litre mark on Republic Day while the prices in Mumbai were nearly ₹93/litre. In other metropolitan cities such as Chennai and Kolkata, the prices were at ₹88.82/litre and ₹87.69/litre.
(With agency inputs)
