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When there is so much sound and fury on rising fuel prices that have hit the ceiling, we did some calculation on the basis of rising petrol price in a real time frame by breaking it into two distinct segments.

First, lets consider the period between 2004 and 2014 when Manmohan Singh was heading UPA-1 and UPA-2 as Prime Minister and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi was Chair of the UPA. And then we have Narendra Modi as Prime Minister, continuously since May 2014.

In June 2004 price of petrol was Rs 35/litr
In May 2014 it was Rs 71 (Manmohan regime)
2014 May to 2021 March (7 years of Modi regime) the price of petrol has gone up from Rs 71 to 100.

To put it on a lighter note, if we take into consideration Manmohan’s ten years in office, then Modi also should get the margin and be allowed to raise the price to Rs. 140 a litre by the time his second term ends in 2024.

Fuel price is also dictated by Central Excise, road cess and VAT charged by the State Governments and is a major source of revenue that supports the budgeted expenditure on welfare and development related activities. Modi government has the option of reducing Central excise but that would bring the massive initiative aimed at HRD, building the economic infrastructure for all round progress to a screeching halt. Credit goes to Prime Minister Modi that instead of taking a populist stand, his government has curbed corruption and is working with a futuristic plan focussing on education, skill development, health, industry and agriculture sectors, self-reliance, infrastructure, defence and security.

In sharp contrast, the 10 year UPA rule is known for rampant corruption, rise of crony capitalists, middle-men and fixers and a series of scams besides dismal showing on infrastructure front. Unfortunately, Manmohan Singh did nothing to address the concern expressed by Rajiv Gandhi, who had lamented at the Congress Centenary celebration event in Mumbai in 1985 that only 15 paise of each rupee spent by the government reach the needy.

On the same page, we thought it would go a long way towards educating the masses, so we are reproducing below a post doing the rounds on social media over the past few days:

All the petrol pumps should have a board like this so that people could understand who is responsible
Basic rate 30.50
Central govt tax 19.97
State govt tax 38.55
Distributor 3.50
————
Total. 92.52