Fuel Prices on March 21: Petrol, diesel prices today in Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and other cities

India imports more than 80 percent of oil requirement. It is feared that the war will spill over into India’s retail fuel prices soon. (Representative Image)

Petrol and diesel prices remained unchanged on March 21 in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, and Chennai, a notification issued by state-owned fuel retailers showed.

In Mumbai, a cut on November 4 had reduced the price of petrol to Rs 109.98 a litre, and diesel to Rs 94.14 a litre.

Delhi had reduced the local sales tax, or the value-added tax (VAT), on petrol from 30 to 19.4 percent from December 1 midnight, bringing down the price by around Rs 8 to Rs 95.41 per litre for petrol. Diesel is at Rs 86.67 per litre.

In Kolkata, petrol and diesel prices remained at Rs 104.67 and Rs 89.79. In Chennai, petrol costs Rs 101.40 and diesel is sold at Rs 91.43.

In Noida, petrol sold for Rs 95.51 per litre and diesel Rs 87.01 per litre. In Lucknow, petrol costs Rs 95.28 and diesel Rs 86.80 per litre. In Jaipur, petrol costs Rs 107.06 per litre and diesel Rs 90.70 per litre. In Gurugram, petrol is at Rs 95.59 per litre and diesel at Rs 86.81 per litre.

On March 20, the price of diesel sold to bulk users was raised by about Rs 25 per litre in line with a near 40 percent rise in international oil prices

Also Read: Who will bear the costs of higher crude oil prices?

Factors behind oil rally in last three weeks

Supply crunch from sanctions on Russia, dwindling oil stockpiles, and worries about a surge of COVID-19 in China hitting demand, drove the oil rally over the last three weeks.

In the last eight trading sessions, Brent oil per barrel has traded as high as $139 and as low as $98 - a spread of more than $40.

The United States on March 8 imposed sanctions on Russia.

Britain also on March 8 said it would phase out Russian oil imports by the end of this year.

EU and Japan are also planning to put a ban on their exports to Russia and imports from the country.

Russia, which calls the military action in Ukraine a "special operation", is the world's biggest exporter of crude oil and fuel products.

On March 16, the International Energy Agency (IAE) said three million barrels per day (bpd) of Russian oil and products may not find their way to market beginning April as sanctions bite and buyers hold off.

Recently, Morgan Stanley raised its Brent price forecast by $20 for the third quarter to $120 a barrel, predicting a fall in Russian production of about one million bpd from April.

Retail oil price hikes likely

JP Morgan earlier in its report said for oil marketing companies to revert to normalised marketing margins, retail prices need to increase by Rs 9 a litre or 10 per cent.