350 petrol pumps to join strike from April 23

Pune Petrol Dealers Association spokesperson Ali Daruwalla said they dcided to go ahead with the agitation as the government was fulfilling their demands of increasing their commission and not allotting new petrol pumps.

“At present,petrol dealers are given a commission of Rs 1.46 paise for petrol per litre and 89 paise per litre for diesel which is not according to the recommendations of the government-appointed Apoorva Chandra committee report which had clearly stated that it should be Rs 1.85 per litre for petrol and Rs 1.08 per litre for diesel. The government is still setting up new pumps even when nearly 30 per cent are running into losses as per an Indian Institute of Management report,” said Daruwalla.

A memorandum from the petrol dealers have already been put up with the government. All India Federation of India Petroleum traders president Ashok Badhwar said last year too when they had launched an agitation,the ministry had said it would look into the matter. “But now we have called for a strike till our demands are met,” said Badhwar.

The committee had clearly recommended to increase the commission of petrol by Rs 393 for every kilolitre on petrol and Rs 170 for every kilolitre on diesel.

“The committee was constituted in September 2010 to help dealers fix the commission at 5 per cent of the invoice valuse among the other things. The recommendations were based on prices in January 2010 and since then the prices have gone up by Rs 13.50 per litre for petrol and Rs 5.50 per litre for diesel. However the same has not been implemented,” said Badhwar.