Petrol dealers in Telangana go on one day protest on Tuesday

Hyderabad: Petrol dealers across the State including Hyderabad protested by not purchasing fuel for a day on Tuesday, demanding an increase in dealer commission which has not been incremented since 2017.

However, according to the Telangana Petrol Dealers’ Association, almost all petrol pumps across the State were operated as usual even as the dealers decided not to purchase fuel for a day from the government.

“Almost all the petrol pumps remained open and the customers were able to fill fuel in their vehicles. We purchased fuel in advance in view of the protest and the pumps have enough stocks to last atleast until Wednesday evening,” said G Vinay Kumar, President, Telangana State Petrol Dealers Association, adding that only a few petrol pumps experienced shortage of petrol and diesel.

The fuel pump dealers across 24 States, including Telangana, joined the ‘No Purchase Petrol and Diesel’ campaign to highlight the financial distress of the petrol pump owners across the country.

“The campaign has been taken over the non-increase of dealer margins over the past five years and the issues with losses incurred from excise duty revisions by the government,” Vinay added.

The dealers association claimed that there was an agreement between Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) and the dealers association that the dealers’ margins will be revised every six months, but this has not been done since 2017.

The prices of fuel have almost doubled since 2017, hence the working capital in business has also doubled leading to additional loans and bank interest and the evaporation losses have also increased proportionately, it said.

The dealer commission is essentially said to be a reimbursement of expenses like salaries, electricity bills, and others which have increased manifold during the last five years. They demanded a revised dealer commission which has been overlooked by OMCs.

The association further demanded that the losses on account of excise reduction should be reimbursed by the OMCs and that future price changes should happen in line with the Dynamic Pricing Mechanism.

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