Faking News: Government to peg next petrol price hike at Rs4.20

Realising that people spent more time cracking Pi jokes than understanding the probably bad economics behind the latest hike in petrol prices by Rs3.14/litre, the government has decided to hitherto follow this pattern and raise prices in equally amusing numbers in future.

If sources are to be believed, the government could soon announce a price hike of Rs4.20/litre for petrol on a day when a court could pass orders on framing of charges in the 2G spectrum allocation scam.

“It would be awesome if the court orders filing some charges under Section 420 of the IPC,” an official working in the petroleum ministry hoped, “A petrol price hike on Rs4.20 in such a scenario would give rise to a deluge of 420 jokes and people would just forget the economics.”

The official claimed that even though the decision to raise petrol prices by Rs3.14 had got nothing to do with the mathematical number Pi, the subsequent comments and jokes cracked by the middle class, the worst hit by this hike, forced the government to think that perhaps it was not a bad idea to keep the citizens hooked this way.

“An irrational decision and an irrational number. LOL!” was a sample joke cracked on the latest petrol price hike, which was apparently the result of the weakening of the rupee against the dollar.

“LOL! Then they should allow us to buy petrol in dollars!” said one middle-class consumer, in full joke-cracking mode, refusing to think over the economics behind the price rise.

“We didn’t expect such a favorable reaction on a rather unfavourable decision, but we are not complaining!” the petroleum ministry official referred to the reactions by the citizens of India over the 12th price hike since June last year.

“In retrospect, we now regret missing the opportunity to raise the petrol prices by Rs9.11 on September 11,” the official rued the missed opportunity.

“They think that the joke will be on us, while the joke will be on them,” he clarified the thought behind raising the petrol prices by special numbers.

Rahul Roushan thinks he can make some sense through nonsense. He attempts the same through his news satire website www.fakingnews.com