Self explanatory and logical : Monitoring their movements
- Sangai Express Editorial :: May 14, 2013 -

Monitor their movements. It is self explanatory and obviously logical.

The decision of the Indian Oil Corporation to fit Vehicle Monitoring Units under the Vehicle Tracking System on fuel tankers should be seen and understood against the backdrop of fuel, especially Kerosene drying up at the retail outlets, but 'literally' flooding the black market at a price.

Kerosene is no longer the poor man's fuel. Completing the farce of the understanding that has come to be associated with anything that comes under the PDS items, or controlled items, where the Government fixes a nominal price so that those at the lower end of the economic strata can have easy access to it.

A device to track the movement of the oil tankers and it should be easy to deduce the modus operandi, not the whole exercise, but at least a significant part of it.

Take the load from either the IOC depot at Chingmeirong or from the designated refineries at Assam and then do the disappearing act, without depositing the load at the designated retail pumps.

Obviously an inside job, with the chain of command possibly coming down from the higher level to the level of the driver. Diversion.

Take the load, but instead of off loading it at the designated retail outlets, take it to a safe house or rather a safe storage tank and then later create the black market where the same is sold at inflated rates to the consumers.

As things stand today, of the 70 oil tankers engaged to ferry SK Oil, 62 of them have been fitted with the Vehicle Monitoring Units under the Vehicle Tracking System, so far.

A novel idea, it may have been to divert the fuel, but the idea of fitting the tankers with the Vehicle Monitoring Units is an indication that the IOC has obviously wisened up to the acts of the unscrupulous elements within.

The only question and this is important, is whether these elements may not have taken a step ahead already to beat the system. This is how criminals work and diverting PDS items meant for the poorer section of the people will certainly qualify as criminal acts.

A word of caution is also in line here. If at all the new mechanisms or measures put into place are to have any significant meaning, the bucks should not stop at the drivers and their helpers or assistants actually ferrying the load.

The long arms of the- law should also catch up with those who come higher up in the pecking order.

Hard to imagine or even entertain the idea that such a modus operandi can be executed, and that too so effectively, without the knowledge and backing of the people who sit in the plush offices and have the command bell at the tip of their fingers.

The purpose of fitting fuel tankers with the new device should go beyond tracking the movement of the vehicles or tankers, but should also aim at breaking the backbones of the big fishes or dismantle the cartel, which is nothing short of an organised network of well placed people.

Maximising profit is at the heart of every business venture, but there is also something called ethical dealings. It is the absence of the ethical aspects which have led to the burgeoning black market of fuel and nowhere is this more visible than during times of economic blockades.

At the moment, the attention of the IOC seems to be on the tankers ferrying K-Oil and the sooner it is extended to the others, such as those ferrying petrol and diesel, the better it would be.

Drug cartels and now fuel cartels. Time to break their backbones. The people of Manipur have been bled dry for too long.