Oil minister M Veerappa Moily on Monday ruled out a rollback in the Rs.1.50-a-litre hike in petrol and 45 paise a litre increase in diesel rates, saying only a small raise has been passed on to consumers.

?I think everybody would appreciate that we have not put a lot of burden on consumers. It is only small doses,? Moily told reporters.

?Our country imports 73-75% of oil. We need to pay R7 lakh crore for the imports. Where do we find that kind of money?? he said.

The government had increased diesel rates by 45 paise a litre and petrol by R1.50 a litre on Friday. The hike in diesel prices in two consecutive months is aimed at eliminating under-recoveries of the oil marketing companies.

?Whenever there is over-recovery (profit on sale of petrol), we have made it clear that it has to be passed on to consumers. So last month you saw a 25 paisa reduction in rates,” Moily said.

Meanwhile, GAIL (India) on Monday commissioned its 1, 000-km liquefied natural gas (LNG) pipeline from Dabhol to Bangalore, which would supply fuel to power plants and supply piped cooking gas to the city for the first time.

The R4500-crore pipeline, which began operations on Monday by supplying gas to Toyota Kirloskar Auto Parts’ 6.5 MW power plant located near Bangalore, runs through 10 Karnataka districts and also involves a 73-km network in Bangalore city.

?We will immediately ask GAIL to provide for CNG, and there is potential to have three or four CNG terminals here. They can start at least one immediately,? said Moily. He added that additional equity would be provided to the joint venture if required.

Moily also said that a memorandum of understanding would be signed between ONGC, BPCL and the state government over the next month for an LNG terminal in Mangalore, a project that had initially been mooted six years ago.

The GAIL pipeline will be extended to Mangalore this year and to Kochi by the end of next year. Moily said the Dabhol-Bangalore gas pipeline network would be branched out at Chitradurga and taken to Mangalore, as the baseline survey for the 350-km stretch has been completed.

GAIL chairman and managing director B C Tripathi said the company had imported two shiploads of LNG at Dabhol and a third would be imported in the next 10 days. The gas supply is expected to help power generation utilities save R700 – 800 crore in fuel costs.