Shillong: The Meghalaya Democratic Alliance government has announced its decision to further reduce the tax on petrol and diesel by Rs 5.20 with effect from Friday midnight.
The decision was taken by the cabinet chaired by Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma.
This was in line with the Government of India’s decision of reducing Central Excise Duty on petrol & diesel by Rs 5 and Rs 10 respectively from November 4.
Addressing media persons after the meeting, Deputy Chief Minister Prestone Tynsong said, “In line with the advice of the Central Government, the state government has taken a decision that further reduction on the prices of petrol & diesel has to be implemented immediately from midnight.”
Tynsong has also reminded that the state government had earlier reduced the value-added tax (VAT) to 20 per cent on petrol and 12 per cent on diesel.
“With today’s decision, we have further reduced the tax percentage on petrol from 20 per cent to 13.5 per cent per litre and for diesel from 12 per cent to 5 per cent per litre. The amount if converted into hard cash, then it comes to Rs 5.20 per litre for both petrol & diesel,” he said.
Stating that the prices of petrol and diesel in the state is the lowest in the country, the deputy CM said as of today the price of petrol in Guwahati, Assam is Rs 94.58 per litre after reduction while in Meghalaya’s Byrnihat it is Rs 92.38 per litre and in Shillong Rs 93.91 per litre.
Similarly, the price of diesel in Guwahati is at Rs 81.29 per litre while in Byrnihat at Rs 79.41 per litre and Shillong at Rs 80.57 per litre.
“Therefore, the total relief on petrol is Rs 10.95 per litre in Byrnihat and Rs 11.08 per litre in Shillong while for diesel, the total relief is Rs 16.67 per litre in the entire state of Meghalaya,” he said.
Tynsong said that the state will incur a revenue loss of about Rs 100 crore for the next five months from November to March 31, 2022.