Jan 8 (Reuters) - India's fuel consumption rose to a
seven-month high in December to about 20.054 million metric
tons, 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% from 18.89 million tons in November, data showed. It was
up around 2.6% compared with the same period a year earlier.
    Sales of diesel, mainly used by trucks and commercially-run
passenger vehicles, rose by 0.9% month-on-month to 7.60 million
tons.
    Sales of gasoline in December slipped 4.5% from the previous
month to 2.99 million tons.
    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% from
November, while fuel oil use increased by 9.6% in December.
    Cooking gas, or liquefied petroleum gas, sales rose by 5.6%
to 2.63 million tons, while naphtha sales jumped by 27.9% to
about 1.33 million tons, the data showed.
    DOMESTIC SALES (in million tons)
             2023     2023   2023   2022   2022   2022
             Dec.     Nov.   Oct.   Dec.   Nov.   Oct.
 Diesel      7.60     7.53   7.63   7.79   7.76   6.99
 Petrol      2.99     3.13   3.14   2.98   2.86   3.00
 LPG         2.63     2.49   2.50   2.57   2.46   2.39
 Naphtha     1.33     1.04   1.19   1.04   0.93   0.86
 Jet fuel    0.72     0.69   0.69   0.66   0.62   0.62
 Kerosene    0.04     0.04   0.03   0.04   0.04   0.03
 Fuel Oil    0.57     0.52   0.53   0.62   0.58   0.59
 Bitumen     0.79     0.70   0.75   0.72   0.85   0.59
 TOTAL      20.05    18.89   19.47  19.54  19.10  18.58
 
 (Reporting by Brijesh Patel and Harshit Verma in Bengaluru;
Editing by Jacqueline Wong)