The strike of Oil Sector Officer’s Association (OSOA) – an association of nearby 55,000 officers and employees of Oil and Gas Marketing Companies – is commencing to show its impact on second day as most of the petrol pump are reportedly reached at edge of dryness and can face severe crisis if supply of fuels can not be resumed soon.
The officers and employees of Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL), Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL) had called a nationwide strike on Wednesday, demanding higher wages as OSOA had alleged the government was considering to approve lower salary structure in comparison of the Central government’s officers.
However, the Centre has stated this strike ‘illegal’ and Delhi High Court has ordered to arrest the leaders involved in strikers under Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA); even though the strike has entered in the second day defying the Delhi High Court’s order and because of continuous failure of talks between the OSOA leaders and high level ministerial committee headed by Union Home Minister P Chidambaram.
The Delhi and Assam government have reportedly arrested two OSOA leaders while the companies have sacked as much as 20 employees – 11 from the ONGC, and three each from IOC, BPCL and GAIL. All these companies, including HPCL, are public sector undertaking (PSU) companies and control almost entire procedure of production, transportation and supplying of transport fuels, natural gas and domestic crude oil.
According to reports, the situation is still under control as the officers and employees of Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) have not joined the strike so far but the reduction in the production and supply will soon make the circumstances tougher as prior two days strike the oil strikers had deducted half of the production and supply. And since Wednesday, the production and supply in oil striking companies have further shrunk.
An official source from IOC has informed the media that its four refineries – Koyali (260,000 barrels per day (bpd) capacity), Panipat (240,000 bpd), Mathura (160,000 bpd) and Haldia (120,000 bpd) – are going to be shut down soon due to this strike. Similar reports have come from ONGC’s official where its South Bassein and satellite fields in the Western offshore and privately operated Panna Mukta and Tapti fields have been shut down.
Due to shortage of natural gas supply, several fertiliser and power plants have affected badly. The National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) has also informed about falling the generation due to gas supply scarcity.
The report from aviation sector is also not good. Official sources from Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport, Delhi has informed that flights were being late due to delay and dearth of Aviation fuel supply while reports from several parts of Delhi have stated that the oil crisis in the petrol pumps can be reached to acute level tomorrow as toady was holiday (due to Muharram) and demand was half in comparison of other days.
The government, on the other hand, informed that Chidambaram was reviewing the situation erupted from the strikes of oil sector executives and truckers by convening a high level meeting with Cabinet Secretary, Petroleum Secretary and Transport Secretary. But OSOA has reported no progress in the talk as government is not ready to accept its demand, and the strike will continue until government accept its demands.
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