A week after the Centre announced a 62 per cent hike in prices of natural gas produced domestically, the state-run Gujarat Gas on Tuesday increased the retail price of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) by Rs 2.5 per kilogram and Piped Natural Gas (PNG) at Rs 9.5 per SCM (Standard Cubic Meter). The spike in natural gas is expected to take a toll on ceramic and other industries in state that use gas as fuel.
“Despite the 62 per cent increase in prices by the Centre, the City Gas Distribution Companies have conservatively increased the prices. Instead of a minimum of Rs 5-6 rise for CNG, we have increased it only by Rs 2.5 per kilogram,” said an official from Gujarat Gas which is a natural gas distribution company owned by Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) and is one of the biggest CGD operator in the country.
The CNG prices in Gujarat have been raised from Rs 54.45 per kilogram and after the new prices kick in customers have to pay Rs 58.10 per kilogram which includes taxes. The increased prices of natural gas will also lead to a hike in prices of cooking gas provided through pipelines to households. The Piped Natural Gas (PNG) prices for residential consumers have been hiked to Rs 25.75 (plus taxes) from the earlier Rs 23.91 per SCM.The biggest increase is for industrial users of natural gas. The prices of ceramic and tile units have been raised by Rs 9 to Rs 47 per SCM, while for the rest of the industries the prices will be Rs 48.80 per SCM.
“The hike in prices for industrial consumers like us is Rs 11 per SCM after considering the taxes. This will increase our production costs and it will adversely affect our exports in the current sugglish market. This hike comes a month, after the company raised the prices by Rs 5 per SCM,” said Mohan Kundariya, a veteran ceramic industry player from Morbi.
A couple of days ago, Adani Total Gas Limited had made a similar hike. The CNG prices in Ahmedabad were raised by Rs 2.56 per kilogram and PNG prices for residential increased by Rs 2.03 per SCM. The Adani Group company also raised the industrial and commercial PNG prices by Rs 5 and Rs 8 respectively.
Comment here