New Delhi. The Government of India is going to take a big step to give relief to the common people from the prices of petrol and diesel. After cutting excise duty, now the central government is going to extract 5 million barrels of crude oil from the country’s strategic oil reserves, so that the availability of crude oil will increase and its price comes down. The US and China have already taken the initiative to extract crude oil from their strategic oil reserves. India’s extraction of 50 lakh barrels of crude oil can reduce the prices of petrol, diesel by up to three rupees per liter. Significantly, in strategic oil reserves, crude oil is stored for war and other emergencies. oil strategic petroleum reserves
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It is worth noting that the Central Government has recently reduced the excise duty by Rs 5 on petrol and Rs 10 on diesel. Despite this, the price of petrol in different states of India remains from 95 to one hundred rupees a liter. On the other hand, despite the low crude oil price in the international market, it is at $ 78 a barrel and OPEC, a group of oil producing countries, has refused to increase production. Only then, for further reduction in oil prices, the Government of India is going to extract oil from strategic oil reserves.
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According to official sources, along with America, China and other big economies, India is also working on bringing more crude oil to the market. The process will start in a week. Crude oil extracted from India’s strategic reserves will be sold to Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd. Both these state-run oil refinery units are linked to strategic oil reserves through pipelines.
A government official says that if needed, India can also decide to extract more crude oil from its strategic reserves. This will help in bringing down the prices of crude oil. Significantly, India has established strategic oil reserves on both its western and eastern coasts, these underground oil reserves have been built in Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh and Mangaluru and Padur in Karnataka. Their total storage capacity is about 38 million barrels.
