ISLAMABAD: Minister for Finance and Revenue Miftah Ismail Wednesday said the government had decided to withdraw subsidies from the petroleum products and raise the prices of petroleum products effective from June 16.
Addressing a press conference here along with Minister of State for Petroleum, Musadiq Malik, the finance minister announced that the price of petrol had been raised by Rs 24.03 per liter and the new price would be Rs 233.89.
He said the High-Speed Diesel’s price had been increased by Rs 59.16 per liter and the new price would be Rs 263.31 per liter, that of Kerosene Oil by Rs 29.49 per liter to Rs 211.43 and the price of Light Diesel Oil had been increased by Rs 29.16 per liter to Rs 207.47 per liter.
The minister added that the government had no option but to raise the prices because the country’s worsening economy was not in a position to bear further losses.
He said under the government’s “Sasta Petrol, Sasta Diesel” scheme, the government was already providing Rs 2000 per month to the 8 million families, while 6 million more families were also eligible to get Rs 2000 under the scheme.
Musaddiq Malik said the consumption of petrol in the country was 9 million tons per month and that of Diesel was 8.8 million. If the government would not increase the prices, the government would have to bear the loss of Rs 100 billion.
He said the decision was taken after a detailed discussion and with a heavy heart; the government had to take this tough decision.
Miftah Ismail said in May only, the loss in terms of petroleum products had exceeded Rs 120 billion which was three times more than what was required to run the civil government.
He said he had never witnessed such a worse economic situation than the country was facing now and it was due to the mismanagement of former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government.
The previous government, he said took some measures to trap the PML-N government but in fact, they trapped the country and put it on the verge of default.
The minister added that in February 2022 the PTI government had agreed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that they would charge Rs 30 Petroleum Development Levy (PDL) on every liter of petrol and diesel with e additional 17% of sales tax.