TS bunks running out of diesel, dealers body cautions

HYDERABAD: Supply restrictions by oil companies in the state could result in many fuel bunks running out of their diesel stocks in the next couple of days, just as a new work week begins on Monday, Rajiv Amaram, joint secretary of the consortium of Indian petroleum dealers, warned on Saturday.

He said that, for instance, 13 out of 40 bunks that placed orders in Patancheru, Medak and Sangareddy districts had received stocks on Saturday but in restricted quantities. A few were jumbled up. Some pumps, which had ordered 4,000 litres of petrol and 8,000 litres of diesel, had received 8,000 litres of petrol and 4,000 litres of diesel.

“Oil company executives are telling us that they are being given quotas for distribution and once that is distributed, there is nothing more they can do,” he said.

 “If the state civil supplies department does not step in quickly, around 70 per cent of pumps in the state could run out of their diesel stock,” he said, adding that pumps were being given just about half of their diesel order. The situation in many pumps in the state right now is that they have more petrol than they can sell daily, but oil companies are unwilling to send just diesel. Their explanation is that they are suffering Rs 28 loss on every litre of diesel, Amaram explained.

In the rural areas, where farmers have started harvesting paddy, and transporting it to market yards, or after their purchase to rice mills, the situation is getting worse. Pump owners in districts are being told not to sell diesel to heavy vehicles but only to autos and cars as the focus is on the passenger sector. The oil companies are apparently not worried about the diesel requirement for tractors and lorries moving paddy from place to place, Amaram said.