Increase in gas tariff not to hit middle class, says petroleum minister

ISLAMABAD: Petroleum Minister Chaudhry Ghulam Sarwar on Monday said that the government’s decision to increase gas prices will not hit the common consumer as portrayed in a section of media, ARY News reported.

Addressing media in the federal capital after an Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) meeting which approved hike in gas tariff, the minister explained that the government had divided consumers into three categories and domestic consumers will not be hit hard by the hike.

“The consumers were previously divided into three slabs i.e lower middle class, middle class, upper class and there was no pricing distinction; now we have just increased the price for middle and lower middle class’ by 15 to 20 percent which means if they paid 252 rupees in past, now they will pay Rs275 only,” said the minister.

He added that upper class is a minority as far as gas consumption is considered and they may get bills amounting more than Rs2000.

About the LPG price, he said that the import tax on the liquefied petroleum gas is being reduced to zero.

Answering a question, the minister said that the increase in gas prices won’t result in an increase in power prices as power sector has been ordered not to transfer the hike upon consumers.

The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) on Monday approved the hike in gas tariff while reducing the import tax on Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG).

Minister was of the opinion that the approved increase in gas tariff has been made while keeping in view the notion of burdening the poor consumers as less as possible, henceforth, a larger increase in tariffs was placed on higher tariff slabs, he claimed.

Moreover, the economic body had decided to cut the import tax on LPG to ten per cent. In its previous meeting on September 10, the ECC had decided to keep the gas price unchanged.