The government has collected Rs 6,791 crore as tax, cess on petrol, diesel consumed in the Union Territory during the last five financial years.
As per the official figures accessed since 2016-17 to 2020-21 government has collected a whopping sum of Rs 6,791 crore. Of which Rs 1110 crore were collected in 2016-17, Rs 1329 crore in 2017-18, 1449 crore in 2018-19, Rs 1459 crore in 2019-20 and Rs 1444 crore in 2020-21.
The Union government has collected Rs 4 55,069 crores as taxes and cess on petrol and diesel last year (2020-21).
Among the states, Maharashtra collected the maximum amount of 25,430 crores as sales tax and VAT on all petroleum products, followed by Uttar Pradesh collecting an amount of Rs 21,956 and Tamil Nadu collecting Rs 17,063.
In November, the central government slashed excise duty on fuel prices; Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha announced a further reduction in petrol and diesel prices by Rs 7 per litre.
The finance department has revised the tax rates and cess to bring down the fuel prices in J&K, which was a long pending demand of residents.
With the decline in tax rates, the petrol price is hovering around Rs 100 a litre, reaching its highest rate at Rs 117 per litre before the government revised the tax rates.
As the petroleum prices have cooled down, it has brought some respite to consumers whose petroleum bills witnessed a constant increase.
The Centre earned nearly Rs 8.02 lakh crore from taxes on petrol and diesel during the last three fiscal years.
The excise duty on petrol rose from Rs 19.48 per litre as of October 5, 2018, to Rs 27.90 a litre as of November 4, 2021. The duty on diesel rose from Rs 15.33 a litre to Rs 21.80 during the same period. Within this period, the excise on petrol fell from Rs 19.48 per litre as of October 5, 2018, to Rs 17.98 as of July 6, 2019, while excise on diesel reduced from Rs 15.33 to Rs 13.83 during the same reference period.
Oil marketing companies on Thursday kept diesel and petrol prices unchanged across major Indian cities.
Across the country, the price of the fuel remained essentially unchanged, but the retail rates varied depending on the level of local-level taxes.
