Traffic on the National Highway at Maddilapalem was disrupted for about half-an-hour in phases as ‘rasta roko’ was staged by the Communist Party of India-Marxist, in protest against the steep hike in the prices of petrol and diesel, on Tuesday.
The party workers went in a rally from the party city committee office to Maddilapalem junction. They raised slogans demanding roll back of the hike in the prices of diesel and petrol and bringing petrol and diesel under the purview of GST. They also denounced the Central and State governments for taxing the common man.
CPI(M) State secretariat member Ch. Narasinga Rao said the international market price of crude oil, which was $140, before the Modi Government came to power in 2014, came down to $ 60 a barrel subsequently. It had further dropped to $28 and at one stage and was now $ 80 a barrel.
Though the prices of petrol and diesel in India used to rise, whenever there was a hike in the international prices, during the last four years, the price of petrol registered a hike of 105 % and diesel went up by 330 %, causing undue burden on the common man.
Crude prices
Mr. Narasinga Rao said that the Centre had not even reduced the prices when the international crude prices had dropped. The present price of petrol was ₹83 a litre and diesel was being sold at ₹73 a litre. The removal of the control on fuel prices by the previous Congress government has made it difficult to know how hike was being done by the Modi government from time to time. The hike in fuel prices was having a cascading effect on the prices of other essential commodities, he said.
