Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman faces a Catch-22 situation with oil prices on budget eve. If crude prices continue to spike, all bugdet calculations can go haywire.
On the other hand, if Sitharaman makes a provision for a duty cut when the crude price hits a century, there will be fiscal pressure. With assembly polls looming in five states, a fuel price hike is off the counter for almost three months, building pressure on the margins of PSU retailers even as global crude prices trek northwards.
The benchmark Brent has jumped to over $90 per barrel from a low of $65.88 on December 2, 2021. Analysts have forecast that it could cross $100-105 per barrel soon amidst growing tension in Eastern Europe and West Asia.
