The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Adulterated oil trade thriving

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Dec 10, 2005

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Adulterated oil trade thriving

LAW &ORDER A senior police official says that it is the responsibility of various agencies to check adulteration and sale of petroleum products, writes K.V. Subramanya

THE ARREST of six members of an "oil mafia" that was allegedly adulterating and selling furnace oil supplied by the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) has shown that adulterated oil trade is thriving in the city.

The Central Crime Branch (CCB) officials on Thursday arrested six persons and seized two tankers near Rajanukunte on Doddaballapur Road. According to Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime) M.D. Basannavar, the accused had taken the tankers into a thickly wooded area near Rajanukunte, tampered with the IOC seals, unloaded the pure oil and replaced it with waste oil.

Over the years, the underworld elements of Bangalore have shed blood over sharing the ill-gotten money from the adulterated oil trade. Though the adulterated oil business is presently not contributing to criminal activities on a large scale as it was in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the police opine that still there is a direct link between the oil trade and underworld activities in the city.

Commissioner of Police Ajai Kumar Singh says that they are yet to investigate whether the six arrested on Thursday have any links with the underworld.

As various agencies are involved in monitoring the oil trade, the authorities concerned, instead of taking preventive measures and action against the offenders, have reportedly been passing the buck.

A senior police official says that it is the responsibility of the police, the Food and Civil Supplies Department, the oil corporations and the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board to check adulteration and sale of petroleum products.

Though adulteration of petrol, diesel and other petroleum products takes place at various levels, the mixing of different chemicals and solvents with petroleum products is done mainly during transit: from the oil corporations' depots to petrol pumps.

The criminal nexus between the private transporters, who lift oil from depots to pumps, gangsters and unscrupulous elements in oil corporations, is the main cause for the illegal oil trade, says the official.

Some private transporters have designed their tankers in such a manner that chambers are created in the tankers to facilitate easy mixing of chemicals with petrol. The police had seized such tankers in the past.

Adulteration takes place at petrol pumps also with the connivance of pump owners. But the police claim that due to certain legal and technical reasons they have not been able to trace the exact source of adulteration and also the nature of chemicals used for mixing. Unless we can ascertain these aspects, we cannot book cases against all the offenders, the police say.

While the police say that the oil corporations should properly seal the tankers and ensure that adulteration does not takes place during transit, the corporation officials state that the police should keep a watch on criminal elements involved in the trade as mixing takes place beyond the corporations' jurisdiction.

Some senior police officials suggest that instead of hiring private tankers, the oil corporations should have their own tankers to supply fuel from their depots to petrol pumps to prevent adulteration during transit.

There are also some officers who are in favour of constituting special squads comprising representatives of the police, oil corporations, Food and Civil Supplies Department and the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board to deal with the problem.

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