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Basharat Peer in New Delhi
The Supreme court on Friday formed a panel of Amicus Curiae Harish Salve, Additional Solicitor General Mukul Rohtagi and the central government counsel Kapil Sibal in the Compressed Natural Gas case to find a way out to reduce the painfully long queues at the CNG filling stations in Delhi.
Due to the shortage of CNG, Delhi's transporters have been waiting for hours together at filling stations.
The three judge bench of the Chief Justice A S Anand, B N Kripal, Justice V N Khare, however, deferred the judgement to September 21, after hearing the arguments on the affidavit filed by the Delhi government seeking extension of September 30 deadline to convert all the commercial vehicles plying in Delhi to the CNG mode.
However, there were indications that whereas the buses would have to run on the CNG mode, the autorickshaws and taxis would get to run on other clean fuels, apart from CNG.
Counsel for Delhi government Waseem Qadri told rediff.com that the court had remarked that autorickshaws and taxis would have to follow the Euro-2 norms.
But the court has not yet stated which fuels would fall in the category of the clean fuels.
The apex court pulled up the Indrapastha Gas Private Limited for having stated that it would be able to provide adequate gas supply and remarked that the steps towards the CNG mode were started on the basis of its assurances.
The transporters, many of whom had converted to the CNG mode, have been having a tough time due to the lack of sufficient CNG.
"Nothing is being solved. It seems solving this issue would require an ordinance only," Himmat Singh, Secretary of the Private Bus Operaters Union, said.
"The government has not formulated any pollution norms, any proper transport policy till now and whatever the bureaucrats produce in the court, the judges take it," Singh added.
The transporters demand that if the central government cannot provide adequate CNG then they should be allowed to ply their buses using petrol or diesel only.
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