Pradhan assures people won't suffer due to daily revision of fuel prices

Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan on Saturday said people won't suffer due to daily revision of fuel prices.

"Petrol and diesel are important commodities and with its daily price revision people will not suffer," said Pradhan.

He added that people will daily get a little profit or loss.

In a bid to allay the fears of the dealers of adjusting with the process, the minister said, "There is no problem in conveying the daily price revision. The retail outlet can easily get the revised price through SMS on daily basis."

On June 8, state-owned oil companies such as Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd, decided on a pan-India implementation of daily price revision of petrol and diesel.

Before the rollout of daily price revision, Federation of All India Petroleum Traders (FAIPT) demanded an automated system to reflect price changes from the state-run oil marketing companies.

The main concern of the dealers is that they will have to stop the sales every midnight for considerable time to change the daily rates.

However, the Indian Oil Corporation on Friday successfully rolled out the daily revision of petrol and diesel prices across the country through its network of 26,000-plus petrol pumps.

The Indian Oil in a statement said, "The daily revision of petrol and diesel will set new standards of transparency, encourage automation drive of petrol pumps and better stock management practices. It is a win for consumers, industry as well as dealers."

Complimenting the Oil and Gas industry for this initiative, Pradhan tweeted, "Proud to share that India is the first country to switch to dynamic fuel pricing on such a large scale at one go."

Indian Oil is monitoring the daily price revision round-the-clock through 87 control rooms (at 70 Divisional Offices, 16 State Offices and one at its Marketing Head Office, Mumbai) to offer quick redressal of queries from the field. Indian Oil has accomplished 100 per cent Retail Sales Price (RSP) updation across its entire network of petrol pumps.

"The seamless implementation of Daily Pricing has been possible due to support from our dealer's fraternity," said Indian Oil Director (Marketing), B. S. Canth.

Since last one month, Indian Oil is regularly conducting awareness sessions with dealers on daily price revision.

The learning's from pilot implementation of daily price revision in five cities has also ensured closing of all the gaps in the existing system that ensured triumphant implementation of fuel price revision across the country.

Indian Oil has developed various information modes for the customers to check the price being charged by the petrol pumps including the mobile app wherein the customers will be able to fetch daily updated prices of petrol and diesel at all cities through Indian Oil's mobile app Fuel@IOC.

It will also enable customers to cross-check the prices applicable in their cities by sending SMS on various dealer codes, including various other options.