India cuts petrol prices from Tuesday

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Indian state-fuel retailers will marginally cut petrol prices from Tuesday, reflecting a strengthening rupee, the country's largest fuel retailer Indian Oil Corp said on Monday.

The new retail prices of petrol in Delhi will be 67.90 rupees a litre, about 0.8 percent lower than current 68.46 rupees a litre.

The partially convertible rupee closed at 52.64/65 per dollar, while Brent crude oil was trading at $111.26 a barrel at 1245 GMT.

"The trends in the international oil market and Rupee-Dollar exchange rate shall be closely monitored and the same shall be reflected in future price changes," IOC said in the statement.

India's three state-run fuel retailers - IOC, Bharat Petroleum Corp and Hindustan Petroleum Corp - tend to move their prices together.

India liberalised petrol prices in June 2010 but the government continues to unofficially dictate prices to refiners, who suffered revenue losses of 26 billion rupees in April-September

"Oil Marketing Companies have incurred a loss of 26 billion rupees approximately on sale of gasoline during April-September due to inability to change retail selling prices to the desired extent in line with market conditions," the statement said.

(Reporting by Nidhi Verma; editing by James Jukwey)