Friday, January 9, 2009

Fuel crisis could lead to price hike

NEW DELHI: Officials of oil PSUs might have called off their three-day strike on Friday evening, but hoteliers in Mumbai complained they had already dented local economies by forcing many restaurant owners to down shutters by shutting off LPG supplies.

The total loss in the past three days has been around Rs 105 crore, they said. ‘‘Restaurants in Mumbai get their gas supply through pipelines. But 40% of them had to pull down their shutters on Friday because of the lack of supply,’’ former (Indian Hotels and Restaurants Association) president and adviser Chandrahas Shetty said.

Mumbai’s neighbourhood grocers and stationers had their stocks fast running out. They feared that depleting stocks might hike prices of essential items like sugar, tea and milk.

‘‘We’ve a stock that will last, at the most, for the next three days. Fresh supplies have to come fast,’’ said a Prabhadevi shop owner. The situation was quite similar in Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh, with grocery and general store owners fearing shortage of essential goods.

Serpentine queues of motorists and dry fuel stations were two features for most part of the day in Nagpur, with the situation being similar across the country.

Although queues at gas stations had eased late Friday as word of the strike being called off spread, tempers were frayed all morning as people in Ahmedabad jostled and scuffled to fill tanks. Police had to be deployed at almost all petrol pumps as people picked up fights with others trying to jump queues that took hours to move an inch. Pump owners imposed rationing themselves dispensing fuel worth Rs 50 to two-wheelers and Rs 300 to four-wheelers to cater to all. The CNG-run autorickshaws made the most of the oil PSU strike, ferrying stranded people.

Commuters in Kolkata weren’t sure how they would get home, with 90% of the petrol pumps going dry by Friday. The state government came out with a rationing of petrol and diesel at the pumps to allow maximum vehicles to get fuel. But most of the pumps couldn’t comply with the order as they had run out of stock.

‘‘I had been in the queue for more than three hours. Who knows whether I will be able to get some fuel to run my car,’’ said Satyajit Sarkar, a car-owner at a Shakespeare Sarani petrol pump.

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Fuel_crisis_over_but_losses_may_hike_prices/articleshow/3958611.cms

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