In search of CNG stickers, long queues and many irate customers

The Delhi government had earlier announced that CNG vehicles would be exempted from its odd-even policy.

At Patparganj CNG station — the biggest in East Delhi — the staff struggled with the task of verifying whether the vehicles ran on CNG and checking their compliance plates.

Read | Civic bodies yet to notify parking operators

Each car was being checked by four people, who opened the hood and checked the gas cylinder’s compliance plate. “We look for the ‘last date of the test’ inscribed on the compliance plate and check if it has crossed the three-year validity period. Even if it is valid, we check if the registration card of the owner has ‘CNG’ mentioned on it,” said one of the workers at the station.

Read | Govt’s radio ad asking people to carpool draws flak from BJP, Congress

A valid compliance plate indicates that a proper ‘hydro test’ has been done to check the condition of the gas cylinder inside the car, he added.
The procedure took nearly 10 minutes; more if the vehicle owner and the station staff got into an argument.

That is what happened when a vehicle owner was refused a ‘CNG sticker’ — needed to exempt him from the odd-even rules — and started arguing his case. The staff told him that the the validity on the compliance plate had expired a year ago and pointed to a list with addresses of hydro-test centres.

Jitendra Kumar, a businessman, was facing a different kind of problem. He had bought a new car but his registration card did not mention ‘CNG’ on it and he could not get a sticker.

“I have requested the transport authority to quicken the process, otherwise I won’t be able to drive the car,” said Kumar.

At another CNG station, at JLN stadium, there were no separate queues. Pradeep Wadhwa, a businessman from Lajpat Nagar, had come here as the situation at the Nehru Place station was “chaotic”. He was initially refused a sticker due to a “typographical error”, but the issue was sorted out within 20 minutes.

Jitendra Pal Singh, one of the workers at the station, said gas won’t be provided to those customers whose compliance plates had expired. A senior employee at the gas station said that nearly 3,000 stickers had been distributed till 4 pm.

At Sarai Kale Khan gas station, the vehicle owners stood in a separate queue while their cars were parked nearby. They were asked to give a printed record of the hydro-test and many didn’t have it. Prateek Jain was one of them.

“I am leaving town on Wednesday and I did not know that I was supposed to bring a printed copy of the hydro test,” he said.

People faced similar problems in several other stations. At Nehru Place IGL station, car owners complained of inadequate staff to handle the process of issuing the stickers.

Raj Vij, a businessman from Kalkaji, complained of mismanagement. “I have been waiting for half-an-hour and they haven’t checked my compliance plate as yet. There is no proper management here. It is taking them hours to stick a simple sticker,” said Raj.

Some car owners, however, had a different take. R N Morya, who stood in the queue at Okhla’s IGL station, said, “Pollution affects all of us… This is an extraordinary situation so the government has to take difficult decisions.”