Domestic oil basket rises to $57.37

The price of India's crude oil basket rose by 71 cents a barrel Wednesday to $57.37 (Rs 2,598 ) from Monday, the petroleum and natural gas ministry said today.

The ministry did not provide the price of the Indian basket for Tuesday. Despite the rise, the price of Indian basket is still over 23% lower than its all-time Aug 8 high of $75.20 per barrel.

The Indian crude basket comprises Oman-Dubai sour grade crude and Brent dated sweet crude in 58:42 ratio.

Wednesday, Brent crude closed at $58.71 a barrel, while Dubai and Oman benchmarks were at $55.98 and $56.97 respectively.

In October till Wednesday, the basket averaged $57.32 a barrel compared with September's $61.04 and August's $70.84.

The softening of crude prices last month provided some relief to India's oil marketing companies that had been reeling under heavy revenue losses.

The state-owned oil marketing companies have not revised retail product prices since June.