 "Fuel consumption rises 6.2% to 20 mn tonnes in December, shows data")
India's fuel consumption rose to a seven-month high in December to about 20.054 million metric tonnes, data from the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) of the oil ministry showed.
Total consumption, a proxy for oil demand, in December rose by 6.2 per cent from 18.89 million tonnes in November, data showed. It was up around 2.6 per cent compared with the same period a year earlier.
Sales of diesel, mainly used by trucks and commercially-run passenger vehicles, rose by 0.9 per cent month-on-month to 7.60 million tonnes.
Sales of gasoline in December slipped 4.5 per cent from the previous month to 2.99 million tonnes.
Sales of sports utility vehicles rose in December, while small car sales fell despite high discounts, data from Indian automakers showed last week.
Sales of bitumen, used for making roads, rose by 12.9 per cent from November, while fuel oil use increased by 9.6 per cent in December.
Cooking gas, or liquefied petroleum gas, sales rose by 5.6 per cent to 2.63 million tonnes, while naphtha sales jumped by 27.9 per cent to about 1.33 million tonnes, the data showed.