People's Democracy

CPI(M) MP Writes to Oil Minister

On Distortion of Facts

The following is the text of the letter written by Tapan Sen, MP to S Jaipal Reddy, minister of petroleum & natural gas, Government of India, on September 17, 2012

I draw your urgent attention to the statement of ministry of petroleum & natural gas published as advertisement in the leading national dailies on September 17, 2012 under the heading “Was the increase in price of diesel & capping of Domestic LPG avoidable? No, for the following reasons:”

I totally disagree with the “reasons” detailed therein but that is not the purpose of drawing your attention here.

The point is that the said statement published by the ministry suffers from misrepresentation of facts when it referred to the recommendation of the ‘all party standing committee of parliament on petroleum & natural gas on capping of domestic LPG’.

Number one, the recommendation of the standing committee on petroleum & natural gas (8th Report on Demands for Grants-2011-12) on this particular issue was not at all unanimous as has been claimed in ministry’s advertised statement. I, as a member of the standing committee, had submitted my ‘note of dissent’ on the recommendation on this particular issue which was published along with the Report and tabled in parliament on August 3, 2011.

Number two, the decision of the government capping the domestic LPG cylinders availability to 6 cylinders annually for all households is at wide variance with what the standing committee actually recommended on that issue, contrary to what has been stated in the ministry’s advertised statement. The standing committee recommended, though not unanimously, the restriction on domestic LPG availability at subsidised rate for  “people having an income of more than Rs Six Lakh per annum including those holding constitutional posts, public representatives like MPs, MLAs/MLCs.”    

Let me again reiterate, I am not arguing here on the merit of what the ministry sought to convey to people through this advertised statement. I like to state here only that such official statement of the ministry of petroleum & natural gas, that too published as an advertisement in all the national dailies should not indulge in misrepresentation of facts as pointed out in the preceding paragraphs.

I would request you to please look into the matter and do the needful so that corrective action is taken at the earliest to put the facts straight and without distortion or dilution.