Our Bureau

New Delhi , June 20

JUST after announcing a hike in petrol and diesel prices, fresh trouble broke out for the Petroleum Minister, Mr Mani Shankar Aiyar, with the Federation of All India Petroleum Traders (FAIPT), threatening to go on indefinite strike from July 18 if their demand for increasing dealers' commission was not accepted.

The Federation wants the commission on petrol and diesel to be raised to 5 per cent of the sale price from the current 1.59 per cent on petrol and 1.27 per cent on diesel.

To press for the hike in commission, petrol pumps across the country were shut on Monday. The FAIPT President, Mr Ashok Badhwar, representing some 25,000 petrol pump operators, told Business Line, "Our repeated attempts to request the Government has met with little results. The Government is offering a 7-paise increase, which is definitely not acceptable to us," he stated.

Mr Badhwar pointed out that the commission on petrol sales was 1.92 per cent and 1.62 per cent on diesel in 2001. This has come down to 1.59 per cent on petrol and 1.27 per cent on diesel in 2005.

"With the operating expenses going up every year on account of minimum wages being revised nine times, power tariffs going up and increase in insurance premium, how do the Government or the oil companies expect us to survive at the current level," Mr Badhwar said. Ruling out any immediate increase in the commission, Mr Aiyar told presspersons after a meeting of the Cabinet that "it was not proper for the dealers to press their demand at a time when the Government and oil marketing companies were shouldering heavy burdens because of the flare up in international oil prices."

He, however, agreed that there was a need for a review the commission paid to the dealers.

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