No let-up in shortage of cooking gas
Patna   26-Dec-2010

With cooking gas shortage persisting for quite some time in the state capital, consumers are facing a tough time. Even though food and consumer protection minister Shyam Rajak directed the oil marketing companies twice in the past three weeks to streamline supplies expeditiously, there are no signs of improvement in the situation.

Thus, gas distributors are taking anywhere between one week to a month to supply gas refills to consumers. There are also complaints that gas cylinders often carry less gas than that marked on them. Consumers have to often cough up anywhere between Rs 100 to Rs 250 extra in the black market for a gas cylinder.

M K Jha booked a refill with United Enterprises located in Boring Road area on December 17. However, he is yet to get the delivery. Manish Shekhar of Sri Krishna Nagar said there is a time lag of 15-20 days between booking and supply.

A housewife at Mahatma Gandhinagar in Bahadurpur Housing Colony said she booked gas with Anjali Flames on December 13 but got delivery 10 days later on December 23. However, Manju Kumari of Kankarbagh said she usually gets gas supply within a week of booking with Anamika gas agency.

The situation is worse in Khagaul, with the only distributor of the town Yogi Enterprises reportedly taking up to 20-25 days for delivery. There are quality concerns too, with flames emitting smoke, said RA Rai. Often, refills are short on weight.

According to a distributor, gas refills are in short supply since Chhath. The backlog of supplies has created scarcity of cooking gas. However, the situation is steadily improving. "We are hopeful that scarcity will be over soon," he said.

Rajak reviewed the situation on Friday with IndianOil general manager UP Chattopadhyay and BPCL's territory manager Rajiv Jaiswal. The minister sought details of refill bookings and supplies to distributors during this fiscal to unravel the reasons behind this scarcity. He directed them to ensure refill supply within five days of booking.

He also asked them to give details of action taken against erring gas distributors and take help of the district administration to check black marketing of gas refills.