new delhi carmakers are opposed to any move by the government to hike tax on diesel cars to offset the subsidy the fuel receives a measure like this would effectively kill diesel automobiles diesel vehicles are more dearer than petrol due to their expensive technology this higher tax more or less offsets the gain a diesel vehicle owner makes by buying fuel at a lower price said pawan goenka outgoing president of siam on wednesdaygoenka who is also the president of mahindra mahindras automotive division said decontrolling of diesel price was a better way to make car owners pay more we have always supported price parity though i admit that this is difficult to implement however this is a wrong time to take this measure as the industry is in the middle of a slowdownearlier in the day differences within the government over pricing of diesel came to the fore with montek singh ahluwalia deputy chairman of the planning commission favouring decontrolling of the fuel while heavy industries minister praful patel advocating subsidies to continue to meet the governments social obligationaddressing the annual convention of siam ahluwalia said india needed to adjust its policy to the energy reality as the world was entering an era of high energy costs the present distortion of diesel and petrol prices should be corrected first subsidized fuel is not sustainable in the longterm and we need to have rationalization of energy securityreacting to ahluwalias comment patel said diesel and petrol price disparity will stay it will not go away as we have a social obligation the minister also said that policy planners and the government need to review their definition of diesel as a dirty fuel there has been a question over the environmental sustainability of diesel technologybut if we look at europe or other developed world the technology has developed so much and proved to be even better than the petrol technology patel addedpatel also rejected the possibility of diesel being freed from government control in the nearterm saying at this moment there is no move in the government to bring any change in the pricingwhile the government had in june last year freed petrol prices diesel still continues to be sold at a subsidized rate