Journalism of Courage
As part of the crackdown on the oil adulteration mafia in the district,the Pune rural police have nabbed two persons working with an oil distributor from Chakan.
The oil distributor,police said,ran an adulteration racket by mixing light diesel oil with furnace oil and water with the help of caustic soda which holds the mixture together for two days.
The Chakan police recently seized tankers of Light Diesel Oil (LDO),used furnace oil and empty tankers worth Rs 45 lakh. B R Patil,sub divisional police officer for Khed division said,All the seized material was owned by a person who,has a licence to sell oil and also owns two-three petrol pumps. He is absconding. But we have arrested a driver and a manager working for him. A search operation has been launched for the oil distributor.
Sandeep Karnik,superintendent of police (Pune rural) said,On the pretext of selling machine oil they sold mixture of Light Diesel,using furnace oil and water. They used to mix these substances using a powder as emulsifier and did it directly in empty tankers. Patil added,We have also caught one other small group who used to stop tankers on their way to the customers,take out oil and mix water.
Inspector Sushil Kadam said,The suspects have told us that after about 48 hours the mixtures get separated into its original constituents. Adulterated machine oil causes serious damage to machine parts. The two arrested suspects have been remanded in police custody.
