It has been claimed by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs of the Government of Karnataka that the amount of ethanol in ethanol mixed petrol is more than 20 percent. Minister Rizwan Arshad said that this has been revealed in the testing of petrol samples in different NABL accredited labs of Karnataka. Illegal and excessive ethanol adulteration has been found at petrol pumps in Karnataka.
Under the government’s Operation Nikhar campaign, the quality of petrol of major brands available in Karnataka was checked. Samples were collected from Bengaluru, Kolar, Chikkaballapur, Bengaluru Rural, Ramanagara, Mangaluru and Tumakuru for this test. Petrol samples collected from all major oil companies have been found to contain more than 20% ethanol. In this, 31.2% ethanol was found present in IOCL petrol and 30.5% ethanol was found in HPCL petrol.
Labs of oil companies hid information
The Karnataka minister said that when petrol samples were first sent to the oil companies’ own labs (IOCL and BPCL), even though it was mandatory to test the ethanol content, those labs hid it in the reports and did not even record the percentage of ethanol. Hiding this important information has given rise to a deep suspicion that oil companies are deceiving customers and trying to cover up the fact of adding more ethanol than the prescribed limit. Therefore, we collected samples again from different petrol pumps as per the rules and sent them to NABL accredited and ISO certified lab for testing.
Which company is selling how much ethanol by mixing it?
The minister claimed that according to the samples revealed in the lab tests, 31.2 percent ethanol was found in IOCL’s petrol (MS). 30.5 percent ethanol was found in HPCL’s petrol (MS-Power) and 27 percent ethanol was found in HPCL’s petrol (MS). 26.5 percent in BPCL petrol (MS-Speed), 26.1 percent in Nayara petrol (MS), 25.5 percent in Shell petrol (MS), 24.2 percent in BPCL petrol (MS), 22.6 percent in another BPCL petrol (MS), 22.4 percent in HPCL petrol (MS), 20.8 percent in IOCL petrol (MS), and 20.8 percent in Nayara petrol (MS). 20.6 percent ethanol was recorded. Apart from this, 19.9 percent ethanol was found in BPCL’s petrol (MS), 19.2 percent in MRPL’s petrol (MS), and 13.5 percent in Shell’s petrol (MS). All these petrol samples were collected from different places.
Oil companies are making record profits
Minister Rizwan Arshad said that while on one hand the oil companies are earning record profits, on the other hand the common consumers are facing the financial blow in the form of loss of mileage and repair of vehicles. Apart from this, most of the dispensing machines currently installed at petrol pumps are designed only for blending up to 15% ethanol. Implementation of this policy without upgrading the necessary infrastructure and systems according to the high ethanol content of oil is raising many serious questions and the direct loss is being borne by the common consumers.
Karnataka government asked the Center to clarify the situation
Our demands are that the Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways and the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas should clarify the position as the evidence is now on record and the government should publicly disclose how much ethanol is actually present in the fuel being supplied to consumers. Punitive action should be taken against IOCL, BPCL, HPCL and related companies supplying petrol with more than 20% ethanol and a pump-level audit of the ethanol content of all petrol supplied in Karnataka should be published. By setting up a compensation fund for damage caused by E20, consumers whose vehicles have been damaged should be compensated through a time-bound claim process after receiving proof of damage from the authorized service center. It should be mandatory to display the percentage of ethanol blending on petrol across the country and consumers should be given the option to choose fuel so that at every petrol pump it is clearly shown what percentage of ethanol has been mixed in the fuel.
The investigation will continue further
The Karnataka government will continue such investigations across the state and make their findings public. Under the Motor Spirit and High Speed Diesel (Regulation of Supply and Distribution and Prevention of Malpractices) Order, 2005, the state government has empowered the Commissioner of the Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Department, officers of the Legal Metrology Department, Deputy Commissioners, Sub-Divisional Officers, Tehsildars and police officers of the rank of Deputy Superintendent of Police or above to take action against malpractices in the supply and distribution of fuel.
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