New Delhi, July 31 (IANS): Oil marketing companies (OMCs) Wednesday raised diesel and petrol prices respectively by 50 and 70 paise a litre, excluding taxes. The new rates will come into force from midnight.

State-run Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) said the depreciation of the rupee and hardening of crude prices in the international market had necessitated the hike.

"Since the last price change, the international price of petrol has gone up. The INR-USD (rupee-dollar) exchange rate, however, has marginally appreciated. The combined impact of these factors has warranted a price increase of petrol by Rs.0.70 per litre," the country's largest OMC said.

The new petrol prices for New Delhi will be Rs.71.28 per litre, Kolkata at Rs.78.64 per litre, Mumbai at Rs.78.61 per litre and Chennai at Rs.74.49 per litre.

A sharp depreciation in the value of the rupee has made oil imports costlier and put pressure on the marketing firms as they supply diesel at subsidised rates.

OMCs review petrol and diesel prices once every two weeks.

Petrol prices were last hiked on July 14, 2013 by Rs.1.55 per litre and by Rs.1.82 per litre on June 29, 2013. Diesel prices were last raised by Rs.0.50 per litre on June 1, 2013.

Allowing for local taxes, the new rates for diesel per litre will be at Rs.51.40 in New Delhi, Rs.55.74 in Kolkata, Rs.58.23 in Mumbai and Rs.54.76 in Chennai.

According to IOC, even after the current increase, under-recovery on diesel stands at Rs.9.29 per litre.

"In addition to HSD (high speed diesel), OMCs continue to suffer under-recovery on sale of SKO (kerosene) of Rs.33.54 per litre & LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) of Rs.412 per cylinder," the IOC added.

The IOC is expected to incur under-recovery of Rs.68,000 crore on sale of three sensitive products, while the overall industry is expected to incur under-recovery of Rs.1,28,500 crore in 2013-14.