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 Dhaka: Sohel Rana, a businessman, went to buy fuel for his motorbike on April 14, the first day of the Bangla New Year 1433, expecting a shorter waiting time on a national holiday. Instead, he waited for five and a half hours before he could fill the tank of his vehicle at the Meghna Petroleum station on the Kazi Nazrul Islam Avenue in Dhaka. 

He had joined the queue at 7 am and managed to buy four litres of octane only at 12.30 pm. The government has capped fuel purchases for bikers at Tk500 to Tk1,000 over five days due to supply shortages following the US and Israel’s attack on Iran.

Fifteen days earlier, Rana had waited only an hour for fuel. The queues have grown daily since.

Petrol pump owners said the queues across the country are mainly for octane and petrol. With the Strait of Hormuz blocked and the ripple effects of the Iran war disrupting global energy flows, the government had been so far managing limited fuel supplies through rationing access instead of raising prices.

On the night of April 18, the government announced the first increase in prices since the Iran war began.

The retail prices were revised sharply upward from April 19, with hikes ranging from 15% to nearly 17% across fuel categories. A gazette notification issued by the Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Division on April 18 sets new prices at Tk140 per litre for octane, up from Tk120. It sets the price for petrol at Tk135, up from Tk116, and for diesel, at Tk115, up from Tk100.

At 12 pm, Firoz Hossen........

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