Published On : Sat, Jul 1st, 2017

Most fuel pumps are tampered in Nagpur, customers at loss!

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Nagpur: Tampered integrated chips are posing an emergent threat to the customers’ right who deserve right quantity for they are paying the right price. Few raids at some of the petrol pumps in Nagpur, including one of Navneet Singh Tuli, has only shown the tip of the iceberg. Thane crime branch officials, who are on the crackdown drive on such erring petrol pumps should check for similar anomalies at nearly all petrol pumps in Nagpur.

The Thane crime branch, assisted by Khaparkheda police, on Friday seized four fuel dispensers (pulsars) and two control cards at Indian Oil’s Ramnath Fakirchand & Sons petrol pump at Dahegaon on Saoner Road after they were found to be fitted with tampered integrated chips. Police have sealed these fuel dispensers.

However just one or two raids will not solve the problem, feels the sources.

A citizens said that tampering chips at fuel pumps may be the trend at almost every petrol pump in Nagpur.
The latest raid was led by Thane crime branch’s API Abhiraj Kurhade and a team comprising officials of Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), district supply officer and legal metrology among others. The pulsars dispensing petrol were examined by the technicians and experts, who detected the presence of tampered chips.

Such chips (ICs) were also found in two control cards fitted behind the meters in the petrol vending machines. The owner of the petrol pump, Prahlad Sharma, has been made accused in the case.

Last week, the Thane team raided former BJP corporator Navneet Singh Tuli’s Rabjyot Automobiles petrol pump seizing two dispensing units fitted with tampered microchip, which delivered less amount of fuel for the same price.
Clayford Thomas, Ramchandra Tekade and Manish Warade were arrested following last week’s raid. They are still in the custody of the Thane police till June 30.

Abhishek Trimukhe, DCP of Thane crime branch, said around 68 petrol pumps have been raided across Maharashtra of which 40 were found to be rigged using tampered microchip technology. Using this technology, these pumps were delivering lesser amount of fuel purchased even when the display would suggest correct reading.

“Around 18 people have been so far arrested in the statewide operation against rigged petrol pumps,” Trimukhe said.
He said pump owners like Tuli and others would be arrested once the reports from laboratories testing the chips and other tampered technologies used to rig petrol dispensing units are available.

Kurhade said the latest raid was based on the information received during the custodial interrogation of Thomas, Tekade and Warade. “Nearly 50 petrol pumps in Vidarbha are under scanner now,” he said.

However sources informed that more surprise raids are likely to follow. However the big question is when pumps being raided are turning out to faulty, then why not introduce a mechanism to make these dispensing machines tamper-free? Just like they did it for electric meters.