Petrol dealers threaten shutdown on Sep 3

Petrol station dealers across Maharashtra have threatened a state-wide shutdown on September 3, protesting the alleged harassment by an agency authorised to check fuel quality.

The dealers, under the umbrella of Federation of Petroleum Dealers Association, said in a statement they also want access to fuel adulteration test kits, failing which they would resort to a shutdown on September 10 and 11.

"The checking of fuel by an Independent agency, SGS, is fraught with corruption while a re-test by any other agency is barred under the modified marketing discipline guidelines with the penalty being the termination of dealerships," the association said.

The 2,700 odd petrol dealers across the state of Maharashtra have been harassed by the said inspection agency, FAMPEDA claimed.

Government had introduced a marker system for kerosene last October to check dealers from mixing the cooking fuel with motor fuels like petrol and diesel.

It had mandated SGS Life Science Services, which has Europe's largest bio-analytical facility, to check against adulteration, according to FAMPEDA. SGS has recently opened its lab in India.

Dealers seek natural justice and demand that the fuel maker testing kit to be made available to all dealers to check fuel quality before decanting the product in their underground tanks, FAMPEDA said.