Oil cos to stop setting up new petrol pumps: Govt

Indian Oil Corp, Bharat Petroleum, Hindustan Petroleum, who currently own about 37,000 petrol stations in the country, have been asked by the Petroleum Ministry to stop "indiscriminate" expansion as it was one of the reasons for mounting revenue losses on fuel sales, a senior official said.     

"There is no ban as such but we are discouraging them from setting up new outlets in already saturated markets," he said.

The companies can, however, set up new petrol pumps in the areas so far untouched by the retail network.     

Despite price hike last month the oil companies are losing Rs 14.92 per litre on petrol, Rs 24.90 per litre on diesel, Rs 38.09 per litre on kerosene and Rs 338.53 per every cylinder of LPG.     

The revenue losses of the oil firms amount to Rs 715 crore per day and the projected revenue loss of these companies for 2008-09 is Rs 2,11,400 crore.