The government in a sudden move late on Friday night made an upward revision of the retail prices of petrol, kerosine, octane and diesel, with the decision coming into effect right from midnight.
However, the new price of petrol is still lower than in neighbouring India, Nepal and Sri Lanka.
The decision in Bangladesh, the government said, was taken following an uptrend of fuel oil prices in the global market under the current world situation driven by the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Also, this comes as the state-run Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation incurred a mammoth loss of Tk 8014.51 crore in fuel oil sales over the last six months from February.
If the global market becomes stable, the government said, measures would be taken to consider re-adjusting the prices.
Within a 40-km radius of the depot, according to the latest move by the Energy and Mineral Resources Division, the prices of per litre diesel, kerosine, octane and petrol were set at Tk 114, Tk 114, Tk 135 and Tk 130 respectively.
The last time the government adjusted fuel prices was in April 2016 when it lowered the prices.
On May 22, the price of diesel in Kolkata was fixed at 92.76 Indian rupees per liter while that of petrol at 106.03 Indian rupees per liter which is still in force there.
If the amounts are converted to Taka, the price of diesel and petrol would be Tk114.09 and Tk 130.42 per liter (considering one rupee equal to Tk1.23).
Kolkata is witnessing almost the lowest fuel prices among major Indian cities.
It means the price hikes of diesel and petrol in Bangladesh are not that high compared to those in India despite the two fuel items getting pricier by 51% and 42.5% respectively.
The price comparison clearly depicts that prior to the hike, diesel was being sold in Bangladesh by Tk 34.09 less per liter than in Kolkata while petrol was Tk 44.42 cheaper compared to Kolkata.
Different countries of the world including the neighboring countries are regularly adjusting the price of fuel oil considering the uptrend of fuel oil prices in the global market.
Since the price of fuel oil was less in Bangladesh, there was a chance of smuggling of fuel oil for which it was the demand of time to raise the fuel oil price, the government said.
On July 27, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said the government does not import petrol and octane as the country gets these as byproducts of gas extraction.
But she admitted the fact that Bangladesh needs to import diesel.
“We’ve much more petrol and octane than the demands we have. We can even sell these sometimes,” she added.
Regional comparison
Until Thursday, Bangladesh and Afghanistan were selling petrol at the joint-lowest price (0.91 euros).
Pakistan and Bhutan were following them with petrol selling for 1.17 euros and 1.22 euros in the two countries respectively, according to rhinocarhire.com.
Cash-strapped Sri Lanka is charging the regional maximum price (1.47 euros) while Nepalese are paying the second-highest price amounting to 1.38 euros.
