K-oil drought darkening homes
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, December 14 2011: The impact of the more than 100 days economic blockade continues to pulverise the people, especially the poorer section as kerosene, otherwise referred to as the poor man's fuel has not been shipped in since the beginning of August 1, the date the Sadar Hills Districthood Demand Committee enforced the blockade.

Information culled from different sources say that Manipur is currently facing an acute shortage of kerosene as the fuel has not been shipped in since August 1, even though the economic blockade was called off on November 28 .

The State share's of kerosene in a month is 2112 kilolitres.

With not a single shipment of the fuel for over four months now, this has had a telling impact on the lives of the poorer section, especially those who depend on the kerosene lamp to light up their homes in the night.

At the height of the economic blockade kerosene was not available at most of the places in the State and even when it was available it was sold at Rs 100 or so per litre.

Left with no choice, many people had to go in for diesel which was more easily available but which emitted much more soots to light their lamps, causing extreme inconveniences to all.

Now even after more than two weeks of the economic blockade being lifted the condition of the people has not improved one bit.

Even today people are hard pressed to look for kerosene to light up their homes, especially with the annual school examination of their children inching closer.

The long hours of load shedding plus unreliability of power supply has only exacerbated the matter.

An official source, while speaking to The Sangai Express however said that in the past four months, some quantity of kerosene were shipped in.

In August and September one third of the total allotment of kerosene were shipped in, said the source.

Out of the allotted share of 4224 Kl for two months and available for shipping in this month, a total of 1400 Kl was shipped in.

However there was not a single shipment in October and November.

Most of the quota for the last two months lapsed as the IOC took an interminably long time to issue the allocation order coupled with the long period it took for the other official processes to finalise, said the source further.

The failure to ship in the allotted share of the State has led to the acute shortage of kerosene in the State, explained the source.

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