LHC moved against Finance Ministry for defying PM’s directives on POL price cut

LAHORE: A petition in the Lahore High Court (LHC) was filed on Saturday against the federal Finance Ministry for defying Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif’s directives regarding a massive drop in petrol prices.

The petition was filed by Advocate Azhar Siddique, challenging the Finance Ministry’s decision to ignore the Prime Minister’s recommendation to reduce the price of petrol by Rs15 per liter. Despite a significant decline in global petroleum prices, the Ministry of Finance only reduced the price by Rs4.74 per liter, the petition stated.

Siddique urged the court to order Finance Ministry to reduce the petrol prices as per the prime minister’s recommendations. Yesterday, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif directed the Ministry of Finance to cut the price of petrol by Rs15.4 per liter.

The Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif in a statement directed the finance minister to further slash the price of petrol by Rs15.4 per liter and that of diesel by Rs7.9 per liter. However, the Finance Ministry reduced the prices of petrol by Rs4.74 per litre and diesel by Rs3.86 per litre. After a reduction of Rs4.74, the new petrol price was fixed at Rs268.36 per litre. The price of high-speed diesel (HSD) decreased by Rs3.86 to Rs270.94 per litre.