Fuel racket: Besides kingpins, F&CS involved, says ACAUT

Dimapur, October 23 : The fuel-adulteration racket in Nagaland was being run not only by ‘kingpins’, the anti-graft Against Corruption and Unabated Taxation (ACAUT) has stated. In fact, the Food & Civil Supplies department itself was in it to make the state “the largest producer of adulterated fuel in the country,” according to the organization on Sunday.

The ACAUT issued a press release on October 23. The group also furnished details (see table) concerning SK oil supply and distribution as detailed by an RTI document stated to have been given to the ACAUT.

The group has demanded that the investigations bring into purview the past 15-20 years, besides ‘sanitizing every ounce of rice, dal, sugar, wheat or liters of kerosene received by every family in Nagaland.’
“In the last 12 years, the F&CS department diverted approximately 12 crore litres of SK oil, meant for poor beneficiaries, to the black market. Thus, the end result being, Nagaland emerged as the largest producer of adulterated fuel in the country,” the media cell of the organization stated.

“In monetary value, 12 crore litres (at the rate of) Rs.40 per litre at today’s market rate would be approximately Rs. 500 crores.”

The group pointed out that fuel adulteration was not confined to the kingpins alone as the state government was trying to make citizens believe. “The fact of the matter is that the F&CS department, along with the kingpins-also the SK Oil stockiest, has been diverting crores of litres of SK Oil to the black market for the last 15-20 years with impunity,” the ACAUT stated.

‘Hundreds of crores of rupees have enriched the pockets of an entire spectrum of society’ most notably politicians and the bureaucratic class as well as the keepers of the law, the ACAUT alleged.

The organization also alleged that the period 2009-2014 saw maximum diversion ‘where virtually nil SK oil reached the poor people.’

Unless the charge sheet of the Special Investigation Team is comprehensive “inclusive of the SK oil diversion” from the last 15-20 years and “the manner of its disposal,” the ACAUT stated, there would be more “unwarranted situation for which the government shall be solely answerable to the people.”

It is ‘absolutely crucial that complete sanitization of Food and Civil Supplies department is carried out with every ounce of rice, dal, sugar, wheat or litres of kerosene received by every rightful families in Nagaland,’ the ACAUT added.