KARACHI, Jan 9: Petroleum dealers have rejected the increase in the petrol margin saying that the government has retracted from what was agreed in the meetings with the petroleum ministry officials.

Pakistan Petroleum Dealers Association (PPDA) chairman Abdul Sami Khan told Dawn that the association had demanded the ministry in the last four meetings to increase the margin on petrol to Rs1.46 per litre.

The petroleum ministry officials had given a clear signal two days back that the margin on petrol and diesel would be increased to Rs1.46 per litre as the matter was already sent to

the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) for approval. But the ECC’s approval on Thursday had disappointed the dealers.

The ECC on Friday approved a new petroleum policy and increased the profit margin of dealers on the sale of all petroleum products (excluding diesel) to five per cent from four per cent. On diesel the margin had been enhanced to Rs1.50 from Rs1.14 per litre.

Sami Khan said that dealers’ commission on petrol (after ECC’s approval) had now actually been increased to Rs1.17 from 85 paisa per litre.

However, the association had no objection over the new profit margin on diesel which was increased to Rs1.50 from Rs1.14 per litre.

He said he was not clear as to why the government officials involved in the meetings with stakeholders had deviated from their position. He said that the government had given a meagre increase in margin on petrol after reducing the petroleum development levy (PDL) by five per cent.

“We are not satisfied with the increase in margin on petrol,” he said adding that the PPDA delegation is going to Islamabad on Sunday to meet petroleum ministry, Ogra and other senior officials and will ask them to review the decision.

The government had not taken into confidence the stakeholders before making any increase in petrol margin, he said.

“Dealers are perturbed as to how they will run their pumps on very low margins. They fear collapse of investments made so far,” he said. However, he said that the decision to revise the oil price review to monthly basis from fortnightly revision was a good step.