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On record
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Forms need not hit LPG supply M Veerappa Moily Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas I have clarified that consumers don’t have to wait for the registration to get LPG. Dealers have been told that ‘Know your customer’ forms can take time, and they should issue the gas
refills.
With
the national policies regarding petroleum products in a flux, particularly on LPG and diesel pricing, the new Petroleum Minister, Veerappa Moily, has a lot on his hands. He laid out his
priorities in a conversation with The Tribune. Excerpts: The country seems to be facing a crisis on LPG. Is there a shortage? No, there is no shortage as far as the consumers of cooking gas are concerned. The current problem is only due to confusion over the registration of customers required to implement the cap on subsidised cylinders. But all states are facing problems with the supply of LPG, especially J&K. Why? I have clarified that consumers don't have to wait for the registration to get LPG. Dealers have been told that "Know your customer" forms will take time, and they should issue the gas refills. In states like J&K and the Northeast, there are certain problems because of the territory. What is the way out? LPG's main problem is the limit on subsidised cylinders. The average consumption is not more than six cylinders per annum. But people say that is not enough. There is a demand for more cylinders especially from J&K and the Northeast, where other fuels are not easily available. We are looking into these issues. J&K Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has suggested that you paint the subsidised cylinder red and the non-subsided ones in another colour. That is a good suggestion. There is no shortage; it is only a matter of pricing. As far as the restriction is concerned, non-subsidised cylinders should be available to people without any hindrance. I have issued instructions regarding this, but will check why these are not being implemented. Why do we need the cap on subsidised cylinders? A lot of money has to be spent by our oil companies in the form of subsidy, which they don't readily get from the government. This way they would go in the red and their rating will come down. The decision on subsidy was taken before I took over, but I am trying to work out ways to rationalise the process and make it easier for the customer. We would like to go for an 'Adhaar' based mechanism, but in the meantime we can pay through bank accounts, etc. What is going to be the focus area in the Petroleum Ministry? Various development plans need to be expedited. By 2016-17, the import of crude oil and gas should be reduced by at least 50 per cent. That is a big target, but I am ambitious. There is a scarcity of gas too, because of which power plants worth 12,000 MW are lying idle. What about importing gas? Importing gas is a costly proposition. For import, what we need first is the infrastructure to handle LNG. We don't have terminals for that. The east coast does not have even a single terminal. We are looking into that. What does that mean for domestic
production? Domestic production has to be increased. We have scope to do that. We have not adopted a shale gas policy yet, which will be fast-tracked. There are a number of gas exploration proposals. We also need to aggressively go for acquisition of assets outside the country, which will bring down the prices as compared to import, which should be reduced. Domestically, we need to clear offshore drilling policies. By 2016-17, we should be in a position to reduce 50 per cent of our import. We also have to attract more investment. What is the controversy regarding
exploration by Reliance? There is a contract between Reliance and the government. We need to go by that. Whatever decisions have to be taken, will be taken in a transparent manner. We need to avoid controversies. The revenue of the Centre should not be lost, but at the same time people should be allowed to do business, otherwise it will shake the confidence of investors. But you have launched an investigation. The question is what investigation needs to be done. I would like to see the deals are being done as per the law, and the contractual obligations are being honoured. Petrol prices have just been brought down. What is the policy? Pricing of petroleum products has been de-regulated. As a result, it is tied to international prices. Each oil company is allowed to fix its prices. The recent reduction was because the prices have stabilised. The ministry will not interfere in this. If there is occasionally a small increase in price, people will not feel the pinch. At the same time, they will benefit also if there is a drop in the international prices. What about diesel prices? We have an issue about the diesel subsidy. We are working on it. There is a demand that we should de-regulate diesel also. But then what happens to the transport sector? And there are certain sensitive sectors. We will come out with a decision in the next 15-20 days. How will you check the kerosene
subsidy? As far as kerosene subsidy is concerned, I am going in for direct cash transfer to the consumer. We undertook a study in Alwar district of Rajasthan and found that 80 per cent of the demand there was fake. There is a lot of evasion and diversion. By the first week of January, we would like to pay subsidy for kerosene in cash directly to the consumer's account. I may not save the 80 per cent being stolen, but at least 50-60 per cent will be saved. We are waiting for an 'Aadhar' based system for kerosene also.
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Profile Harihar Swarup writes about Haji Kalimullah Khan, Padma Shri recipient
He developed “Sonia aam”, a golden variety weighing 200 to 300 gm, and wants to present it to Congress president Sonia Gandhi. He has named some exotic varieties after Sachin Tendulkar, Aishwarya Rai and UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, who has visited Khan’s 22-acre orchard. Khan calls himself a “cipher” even though he was recently conferred the Padma Shri, besides a host of national and international honours. “I scored zero in English, after which I left school and developed an interest in mangoes,” he says. He had inherited a mango plantation from his father. Later, Khan began experimenting with hybridisation. Famous for his work, he was offered a job and home in Iran, which he refused. He does not wish to leave Malihabad, where his family has grown mangoes for generations. Khan randomly picked seven varieties of mango saplings for grafting and in three years, the experiment yielded mangoes of seven flavours on a single tree. At the age of 17, Khan grew 300 varieties of mango on a single tree, a record in the mango belt of Uttar Pradesh, famous for its delicious “dussehri” mango. They were of different shapes, sizes and hues and carried their names on tiny tin plates for identification. The tree is about 100 years old. “This tree is close to my heart. I’m selective about the varieties I grow,” he says. Khan has also brought varieties like “langra” from eastern UP and Bihar, “himsagar” from West Bengal and alphonso from Maharashtra to his orchard. The first “dussehri” was grown some 150 years ago and the tree still exists. There are about 200 nurseries here and almost 30,000 hectares under mango plantation. The economy of Malihabad runs on the “dussehri” mango — the lifeline of 17,000 people who live here, mostly Afridi Pathans. Khan has five sons and three daughters, but his concern is that none of them are interested in his mango business as it is not lucrative enough. He participates in mango festivals across India. “It helps me learn more about the fruit,” says Khan, who can identify the variety of a mango by simply smelling and looking at it.
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Good news
70-year-old Harvinder Singh has succeeded in putting his native village Jassowal Kular in Ludhiana on the world tennis map.
Seventy-year-old Harvinder Singh Sran, Harvey to his friends and an Overseas Citizen of India (OCI), has been steadily moving closer to his dream of getting someone from his village play in the world’s top tennis tournament. Though arthritis keeps him from playing the game he is passionate about, Harvey shuttles between Canada and his world-class tennis academy at Jassowal Kular in Ludhiana. Since he is passionate about imparting training to poor boys and girls, not only from his own village, but also the neighbouring five villages, the academy has about 20 seats for such trainees, who are given playing equipment, diet, training and education free of cost. “Two girls and a boy from my village are already ranked among the top 20 in the country,” he says, hoping his academy would “harvest” an Olympian for the 2016 Rio games. Rimpledeep Kaur, who will turn 17 in December, had no idea what tennis was all about till the work on the academy began in the village. The area is known for producing promising hockey, kabaddi and football players. She got interested in tennis when she saw the artificial surface and floodlights. Six years later, she became the first girl from the village to represent India in the Asia Cup in Hong Kong. She went on to play in the World Cup in Australia. In both tournaments, the Indian team won medals. She was ranked number two in the country in the under-14 category. Rimpledeep now has scholarship offers from US universities. Endowed with endurance and appetite for excellence, the boys and girls from Jassowal Kular and surrounding villages are able to compete with their more affluent and accomplished academy mates, admit coaches. Overseas trainees
The academy gets trainees not only from all across India, but also from the overseas, including Qatar, Dubai, Nigeria, Norway and Germany. Rajbir Kaur, another girl from the village, is shaping up well. She reached the semi-finals in the AITA 1 Lakh tournament at Chandigarh last month. Last week, she helped her team win the gold medal in the Punjab State School Games at Amritsar. She is ranked 26 in the under-18 category for girls in the country. Jajbir Singh is the first boy from the village to get a ranking in the country. Ranked 17th in the under-18 category, Jajbir has made to the quarterfinals of both the International Tennis Federation (ITF) tournaments in Chennai and Hyderabad this year to get into the top 1,000 in the world. Another youngster doing very well is Harsdeep Sandhu, who is ranked 25th in the country. Harvey’s confidence in his village boys and girls has been validated. It may have been the reason why he did not pick any of the 10 sports the Punjab Government had included in the priority list of its 2010 sports policy to produce a world star. Instead, he chose tennis to bring his village on the world sports map. His daughter Simmy and son-in-law Saun Khambral are ranked Canadian tennis players. Though Harvey started playing tennis at the age of 46, he could not continue because of arthritis.
Not a cakewalk
A product of Guru Nanak Khalsa High School (Gujjarkhan) in Model Town, Ludhiana, Harvey travelled to the Philippines to pursue a degree in science and business administration, but ended up selling clothes. In 1969, he moved to Canada and started working in a mattress factory, earning $1.50 an hour, before moving to British Columbia to work in a saw mill while continuing to import clothes from India and Hong Kong and selling them from door to door. He moved to Alberta in 1974, amid a boom in real estate, and became an “apartment specialist”, but the 1982 recession saw his world shattering. He did not give up and a few years later, diversified into marketing renovated homes and apartments. “It was in 2004 that I decided to do something about my dream. People laughed at me when I talked about producing a world tennis star from my village, saying a country that has only one medal winner (2004 Athens Olympics) is now dreaming of producing a world-level player from a village that has no history of tennis,” he recalls. Now, after seven years, his academy has won almost every title that the All-India Tennis Association offers for boys and girls in the under-14, under-16 and under-18 categories. Last year, it won 53 titles at the national level while this year, the academy has won 36.
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Yashwant Sinha, senior
BJP leader Digvijay Singh,
Congress leader Prakash Karat,
CPM general secretary Saif Ali Khan,
Bollywood actor Aung San Suu Kyi, pro-democracy
Myanmar leader
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