The government has capped petrol imports by private oil marketing companies and issued fresh policy guidelines for fuel supply arrangements, alongside a revised pricing mechanism for petroleum products.
The import cap is designed to push OMCs toward lifting more fuel from domestic refineries, which have long complained that cheap import parcels leave their production unsold and undermine the case for upgrade investments. Tying offtake to local refining is meant to keep those upgrade plans — worth billions of dollars — bankable.
For consumers, the near-term effect runs through the pricing formula rather than the pump directly: how ex-refinery prices, freight and margins are calculated feeds straight into the fortnightly price announcements. We'll track the first revisions under the new mechanism closely — see the live breakdown of what's inside a litre on our Rates page.