TIRUPATI: Life has become difficult for Raju (55), who works as an attender at a firm in Tirupati and earns around Rs 8,000 salary a month. He is struggling hard to meet the monthly expenses due to spiralling petrol prices and abnormal rise in the prices of essential commodities.
"Every day I travel to the office, which is 5 km away from my house, on my bike. My monthly petrol expenses crossed Rs 1,000 a month from Rs 600-700 earlier," he rued. Raju, who has been staying in a rented house for more than a decade along with his 50-year-old wife, now has another reason to worry. His house owner demanded a Rs 500 increase in rent.
"Now, I have to pay Rs 3,000 as rent. The house owner cited a hike in taxes and revision of electricity tariff as the reason to increase the rent and now the additional burden fell on me," Raju said. He complained that the prices of cooking gas, edible oil, dal and grocery items saw a 100 to 200 per cent hike in the last one year, making life miserable for lower-middle-class families.
"The lower middle-class, who are already reeling under financial distress caused by the Covid pandemic for the last two years, are unable to cope with the increased prices. Earlier, I worked for two shifts and used to earn more money. But, now as I am aged, my health doesn’t allow me to work for long hours," he said.
The auto and jeep drivers in the temple town are happy that the rush of devotees are back after a lull of two years due to the pandemic. However, the increased prices of diesel and petrol hit their income. Sudhakar, an auto driver said, "When the diesel price was below Rs 100 a litre, we used to earn around Rs 700-Rs 800 a day. After the rise in the price of diesel, our daily earnings have come down."
Skyrocketing fuel
Rs 122.12 and Rs 107.61 petrol and diesel prices on April 06 Tirupati
Rs 111.23 and Rs 97.21 petrol and diesel prices on March 21 in Tirupati