State-run oil marketing companies – Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation -- have decided to reduce the price of domestic cooking gas or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) by Rs 10 a cylinder from April 1 onwards.
Following this, the price of LPG in Delhi will be Rs 809 a cylinder compared to Rs 819 a cylinder till March 31. The same reduction has been carried out in other markets.
Driven by the vigorous thrust of the government on making accessible clean energy to all Indians, LPG has emerged as the preferred kitchen partner for almost every Indian. LPG penetration in India has improved from 55 per cent in 2014 to more than 99 per cent now.
Prices of crude oil and petroleum products in the international market have been on a constant uptrend since November 2020. As India is largely import-dependent on crude oil and the prices are market-linked, the increase in international prices resulted in an increase in the domestic price of petroleum products.
However, due to growing worries about rising Covid-19 cases in Europe and Asia and concerns over the side effects of the vaccine, prices of crude oil and petroleum product in the international market softened in the second fortnight of March 2021.
Accordingly, oil companies have reduced the Retail Selling Price (RSP) of Diesel and Petrol by 60 paise per litre and 61 paise per litre respectively at the Delhi market over the past few days. There was a corresponding reduction in prices at other markets during this period.
