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Lucknow: Hardly anyone had imagined what happened in the Indian bullion market today. After the central government’s decision to increase the import duty on gold and silver overnight, the prices of these precious metals have broken all records in the domestic market. Today, such a ‘stormy’ rise in the prices of gold and silver was seen on the Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX) that investors were stunned.

Gold crosses Rs 1.64 lakh, big jump in silver by Rs 22 thousand

As soon as the news of increase in import duty came, the price of gold on MCX jumped by more than Rs 10,000 to reach the historic level of Rs 1,64,497 per 10 grams. The situation with silver is even more shocking; A huge rise of Rs 22,299 per kg was recorded, after which silver prices have crossed the magical figure of Rs 3 lakh.

Big decision of Modi government: Tax increased overnight

The Modi government has taken strict steps to curb foreign purchases of precious metals and to safeguard the foreign exchange reserves. The government has imposed 10% basic custom duty and 5% Agriculture Infrastructure and Development Cess (AIDC) on gold and silver. After this decision, the effective import tax has directly increased from 6% to 15%. After Prime Minister Modi’s appeal of ‘not buying gold for a year’, this is being considered the biggest policy attack of the government.

Why was the import duty increased? What is the government’s plan?

India fulfills most of its gold requirement by importing it from abroad. Data for the last financial year (2025-26) show that India’s gold imports had increased by 24% to a record level of $ 71.98 billion. Due to instability in the stock market, people considered gold as a safe investment, due to which the demand increased wildly. The government aims to reduce this import by 10-12% so that the outflow of foreign exchange can be controlled.

International market situation and experts’ opinion

Surprisingly, while the Indian market is on fire, the spot price of gold in the international market fell by 0.4% to $ 4,695.99 an ounce. Market expert Ajay Kedia says that the duty increase was not expected, but this decision has taken domestic prices to new highs. At the same time, expert Anuj Gupta believes that in the coming days, gold can go up to Rs 1.70 lakh per 10 grams.