New Delhi: State-owned oil companies on Wednesday blamed a clerical error for announcing a cut of up to 60 paise in petrol and diesel prices and later clarified that the reduction in price will just be 1 paisa per litre each.
"The reduction was supposed to be 1 paisa but due to a clerical error the price prevalent on May 25 was communicated as today's price," said a senior official of Indian Oil Corp (IOC), the nation's largest fuel retailer.
Subsequently, Twitterati missed no chance to target the central government over the 'clerical error' and soon #EkPaisaJoke and #EkPaiseKiSarkar started trending with all sorts of jokes.
Here are a few of them:
https://twitter.com/Secret_Saanta/status/1001797060063039489
https://twitter.com/Rajesh_Arora1/status/1001734533119537153
https://twitter.com/HaramiParindey/status/1001732022274949120
https://twitter.com/rachitseth/status/1001727174024482816
https://twitter.com/DeeptiSachdeva_/status/1001772420905172992
https://twitter.com/appurv_gupta/status/1001710568737329155
https://twitter.com/srrashmi1/status/1001744862016884737
https://twitter.com/CulerOver9000/status/1001780139204665344
https://twitter.com/VinayDokania/status/1001796686404964354
https://twitter.com/VinayDokania/status/1001797863397969920
Petrol in Delhi now costs Rs 78.42 per litre and diesel Rs 69.30.
The marginal reduction comes after 16 consecutive price increases since May 14 when fuel retailers ended a 19-day pre-Karnataka poll hiatus to pass on a spike in global oil rates.
In all, petrol price was increased by Rs 3.8 per litre and diesel by Rs 3.38 in that fortnight.
Prices vary from state to state depending on local sales tax or VAT. Delhi has the cheapest price among all metros and most state capitals.
(With Agency inputs)
Image source: Twitter