The All India Petroleum Dealers Association on Sunday said they were not prepared yet to switch to the daily revision of fuel prices and urged state oil companies to defer the decision to move to the new system from June 16, reported The Economic Times. The association of petrol pump dealers also said they would stop buying fuel from June 16, though they claimed this was not a strike.
“We are just terming it no-purchase till our concerns are addressed,” Ajay Bansal, president of All India Petroleum Dealers’ Association told Mint. “We do not think we are ready to roll out daily fuel pricing across till all the retail outlets are automated. This could lead to transparency issues.” Bansal said the daily pricing system would burden the petrol pump dealers with unnecessary costs and operational chaos. The association represent dealers who account for 86% of the auto fuel sold in the country.
Indian Oil Corp, Hindustan Petroleum and Bharat Petroleum along with the Oil Ministry on Thursday had decided to roll out the new system from June 16 after having run a pilot project in five cities – Udaipur, Jamshedpur, Puducherry, Chandigarh and Visakhapatnam – from May 1. Currently, rates are revised by state fuel retailers on the 1st and 16th of every month.
There are 56,000 retail outlets in the country, of which around 20,000 have automated facilities to change fuel prices. The government has asked state-run Oil marketing companies to automate all outlets by March 2018.
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