Adulteration in Automobile fuel i.e. in Petrol and Diesel had always been a very interesting subject of discussion for the government. There are several rules and regulations governing Petrol pumps ranging from termination of dealership of the pump to the non-bail able offence under essential commodities Act for any violation.Somehow Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas had no confidence on anybody as far as this subject is concerned and they kept making the rules more stringent. It has now became practically impossible for them to keep a track on implementation of these orders.

Government came out with Solvent, Raffinate and Slop (Acquisition, Sale, Storage and Prevention of Use in Automobiles) Licensing Order 2000 (commonly known as solvent control order’ 2000) to further prevent any possible adulteration in automobile fuel. Ironically, at that point of time almost 100% automobile fuels were sold through government oil company owned / operated petrol pumps.

At the same time the central and state governments came down heavily on Naphtha and Kerosene importers for right or wrong reasons. Consequently, due to various steps taken by government the imports of these two products came down to almost nil.In the year 2002 the government liberalized the oil sector and brought many changes in the sector. So as on now you may not need any licence to open a refinery (except transport fuel) you may import any petroleum product freely.In the purview of Solvent control order, those products were brought, which were soluble in Petrol / Diesel. But in this process they did a blunder.

 They included product like Furnace oil / LDO in the solvent control order, 2000. In whole world only some officials in Indian government believe that furnace oil can be adulterated in petrol or diesel and vehicle can move on the road.Furnace oil is a product which is black, viscous, residual oil usually used as fuel for furnaces, bhattis etc. Furnace oil if added in Petrol or Diesel, even at a very low proportion, thevehicle will not reach its destination. The LDO is also black and heavy fuel oil used again for furnaces and gen sets with rpm below 700. In one or two refineries the product is little lighter in colour but its density is considerable higher compared to diesel. In this process the government did not realize that there are thousands of industries, who use furnace oil for production purposes.

Govt. also added a special excise duty of Rs. 2500 (non modvatable) in LDO. The industries that needed lighter fuel in their furnaces were very adversely affected. The industries and associations made some noise but it went unnoticed.

The implementation of this order in different states were very interesting. Many states practically did not implement this order. Even government oil companies did not bother to check whether the traders / industrial customer had the valid Solvent control licence and kept releasing product, if they were satisfied that the party had applied for licence. This went on for several years. The main reason for this implementation of this order went unnoticed because no body would have adulterated Petrol / Diesel with fuel oil like Furnace oil.

After 3-5 years of promulgation of the order, the govt. departments in a few states found that there is a control order, which is nice to implement. Obviously there were practically no traders / industries with the licence. They brushed their expertise of Licence Raj and came down heavily on traders and industries.The departments did not find anything wrong with their actions, because the Solvent order was passed by central government and they were here only to implement. They rubbed the salt of the wounds by putting such conditions to get the licence that you will have no options but to do what you had so far forgotten to do i.e. taking the licence.

Now the run started, the associations went into action, the industries started reading the law carefully and oil companies found that they need to look at this order. Unlike in adjoining states of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, the Maharashtra state government asked the traders to have storage tanks within

Mumbai if they are operating from Mumbai. The land is not easily available and very expensive.There were other problems of getting explosive licence within the city limit for a storage tank. Some traders hired a godown at godforsaken place, but somehow people at the right place were convinced and given them the licence. Most of the traders found they are out of business. In states like Maharashtra practically 90% traders went out of business for not having the licence.

The adjoining states like Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh issued licence without any storage capacity because the trade did not demand. The trader gets the products from oil companies and sends directly to the consignee, who is an end user.While reading this article you must be wondering where is the actual purpose of adulteration in Petrol and Diesel, when product like furnace oil even does not dissolve in petrol / diesel. All the traders and thousands of industries all over India also wonder the same.

At last some of the associations have gone to Court and they are expecting that the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas will look at it and remove such anomalies from the control order. Because courts cannot change the mindset of people change.