Govt slashes petrol by Rs14, high-speed diesel by Rs13.5

The caretaker government on Friday slashed the price of petrol by Rs14 per litre and that of high-speed diesel (HSD) by Rs13.5 per litre for the next fortnight.

According to a notification from the Ministry of Finance, the new price of petrol is Rs267.34 and Rs276.21 for HSD.

Meanwhile, the prices of kerosene oil and light-diesel oil were reduced by Rs10.14 and Rs11.29 per litre, respectively, to Rs191.02 and Rs164.64.

Informed officials had previously said the prices of major petroleum products were set to fall by over Rs10 per litre each on Dec 15 for the next fortnight mainly because of a decline in the international market.

They had said the international prices of both HSD and petrol had declined over the past fortnight by almost five per cent while the rupee had also gained marginally against the US dollar, resulting in a reasonable drop in domestic prices to the consumers.

The State Bank reported the dollar had settled at Rs283.51 on Thursday after losing against the local currency. Dealers said the market stayed calm even though importers were facing a tough time getting their letters of credit opened.

In a separate press release, the State Bank of Pakistan had said its foreign exchange reserves increased by $21 million to $7.04bn during the week ended on Dec 8.

The central bank has been buying dollars from the interbank market to maintain its reserves above the $7bn level. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has been insisting on increasing the reserves but massive debt servicing slashes its reserves.

Additionally, the government has already achieved Rs60 per litre petroleum levy — the maximum permissible limit under the law.

It has set a budget target to collect Rs869bn as petroleum levy (PL) during FY24 made with the IMF but is now hoping the collection to go beyond Rs950bn by the end of June.

The total PL collection crossed Rs222bn in the first quarter ending September, even though its per litre rates had increased slowly over the period on petrol and kept almost unchanged.