Punjab Newsline, Chandigarh, January 18-
Hundreds of petroleum dealers from across Punjab handed over a Memorandum to PMO, Minister Petroleum, Secretary Petroleum and Chairman's of oil companies through the office of State Level Coordinators at Indian Oil Bhavan here on Thursday.
Monty Sehgal, spokesperson for Petrol Pump Dealers Association Punjab (PPDAP) said that the petroleum dealers of PSU Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) of Punjab are deeply aggrieved at the lack of response from the OMCs to heed our several representations regarding the revision of dealer margin.
He further said that our margin revision recommendations as proposed by the Committee Report on RO Dealer Commission 2012 (Apoorva Chandra Committee), constituted by the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas - Government of India, are being withheld by the OMC's.
The dealer margins were to be revised twice in January and July of each year and the same was again reiterated in the industry meeting held on November 4, 2016 between Oil marketing Companies and Dealer Representatives, he said.
“It is inexplicable that for six years now we have been denied any revision despite financial hardship and escalating expenses making it difficult for the majority of us dealers to survive. That we dealers chose to serve the nation despite huge capital losses during Covid-19 and were not compensated by the profit making OMCs during the same period is a known fact,” said Monty.
Paramjit Singh Doaba President PPDAP said,” Post Covid-19, the inflation and rising operating expenses have further exacerbated the financial situation of dealers. Retail prices of Petrol and Diesel have risen to almost double since 2016 but the dealer margin has not been increased,”
Furthermore, we expect a fair margin that provides us and our employees a decent livelihood and provides us with a decent return on our investments. Unable to bear the present state of affairs any further, we submitted this representation, he informed.
We demanded an immediate increase in dealer margins by Rs.4/ltr , with immediate effect as an Interim Relief. Without this relief most of the retail outlets will become non-operational soon due to ongoing capital losses and increasing debt, said Dr Manjeet Singh, General Secretary of Association.We also sought slab-wise increase 8% Up to 150KL, 7% for 150KL to 300KL , 6% for 300KL to 450KL and 5% for 450 KL and above for future to support low selling dealers, he remarked.