Pune: The first day of the implementation of dynamic fuel pricing saw utter chaos and commotion at petrol pumps in the city in the fear of an impending strike by petroleum dealers. While the All India Petrol Dealers Association (AIPDA) had called for a strike on June 16 against the dynamic pricing policy, the strike had been withdrawn on June 14.
Speaking to Sakal Times, spokesperson of AIPDA, Ali Daruwalla said that unaware that the strike has been called off, people are flooding to fuel pumps across the city to refuel their vehicles. “We want to caution the citizens to not believe in the rumours circulating on social media about petrol pumps being closed due to daily price revision. Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Dharmendra Pradhan has approved of our demands and thus the closure call from June 16 has been withdrawn,” he said.
Daruwalla said that the closure call was withdrawn on June 14 as Pradhan assured AIPDA that their demands will be met. “He assured us that the daily price revision will happen when the petrol pumps open at 6 am instead of midnight.
Also, he has instructed the oil companies to quickly finish all modalities related to fixing of dealers’ margin and dealer remuneration and implement the same by July 30. In light of this, the agitation planned by AIPDA was withdrawn,” Daruwalla said.
According to Daruwalla, the rumours about the strike led to a lot of confusion in the city. “We had phone calls all through the day to clarify about the strike and AIPDA’s stance. People were not so bothered about the price revision on the first day of dynamic pricing as they were about the strike,” he said.
He said that on the first day of dynamic pricing, the petrol prices saw a downward revision of Rs 1.12 per litre while diesel saw a downward revision of Rs 1.20 per litre.
Under the dynamic pricing policy, the prices of petrol, as well as diesel, will be revised on a daily basis in line with the international crude oil prices. Earlier, oil companies would revise the prices according to the international prices on a fortnightly basis. After a pilot project in five cities from May 1, the oil ministry had announced the national implementation of dynamic pricing from June 16.
