Fuel price hike….
The fuel price in our country has been hiked between 34 to 66 percent. The new price is petrol Tk 87/l, diesel 55/l and CNG 16.75/c.m. The authorities concerned have said that they had no alternative because the government could no longer afford to give the staggering amount of subsidy to the sector. Even with the price hike, the government will have to spend Tk 100 billion in subsidies on fuel over the next financial year, which is 40% of government's developmental budget.
If we try to detect the actual reasons, we can easily find out that price hike in world market is responsible for this situation. Before 2003, the price of crude oil in world market was only 25$ per barrel. Now the price is 146$ per barrel. So it is jumping up!
The price increase has created a difficult situation for the people because 40% of them earn bellow one dollar per day. The country is already experiencing rising food prices. The price of rice nearly doubled over the past three years.
So it is obvious that the prices of daily commodities will increase once more. As an additional suffering, transportation costs will also increase significantly. This will drive millions of our people into abject poverty.
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