Cooking Gas Crisis Hits Tripura

Agartala, Jan 17 : An LPG crisis has hit Tripura over the past few weeks after the withdrawal of over 10,000 cylinders by India Oil Corporation (IOC) for testing.

The black marketeering of LPG has also been contributing to more woes to the common consumers with a gas cylinder, which is priced at Rs 365, is being sold at Rs 800-Rs 1,000 in the open market.

Consumers were seen in queues in front of LPG outlets in the capital town for over 2-3 hours to collect refilled cylinders. But the cylinders are available in the open market at a higher price.

The State Government has taken a strong exception over the short-sighted move for testing of ‘expired’ cylinders.

Putting blame on the IOC for the present situation, Food and Civil Supplies Minister Manik Dey on Friday warned that the State Government would not tolerate such kind of situation anymore.

Speaking at the inaugural function of Oil and gas conservation fortnight-2010 at Prajna Bhavan here, Dey said that the IOC authority has withdrawn 10,000 cylinders without informing the government that resulted in the artificial crisis of cooking gas.

“How can the IOC authority take back 10,000 cylinders without replacement or informing the State Government”, he said adding that there would have been no problem had the IOC taken proper steps.

He further said that consumers were seen in the queue for over three hours to collect LPG cylinders. The Minister also mentioned that malpractices existed at some petrol pumps in the State. “The government would not take such kind of malpractices”, he said.

Dey expressed dismay over the low turnout in the inaugural ceremony of the programme. “Persons involved in the transport sector should have been invited to attend such kind of programme”, he said.

However, the IOC authority assured the government that they would take all possible steps to mitigate the problem related to LPG cylinders. Altogether 30,000 LPG cylinders were identified as back-dated which needed replacement to avoid mishap.

The Minister took a dig at the ONGC saying that earlier they used to say we are having a lot of natural gas. “Now, the ONGC is asking for commercial price which is not acceptable to us”, he added.