Thursday, July 21 2005 16:55 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Kolkata: With the strike by the Bulk Transporters' Federation of India entering its fourth day today (July 21, 2005), a crisis of Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG) loomed large over West Bengal as the LPG bottling plants of the oil companies were running short of stocks.

The situation has worsened during the day, as there was no movement of bulk LPG by road due to the strike. No solution was also in sight as yet, sources in the Intergovernmental Ocean graphic Commission (IOC) told sources in Kolkata.

The IOC's Haldia refinery, which produced LPG, would have to flare up the gas as its LPG storage capacity was full due to lack of off take, sources said.

Normally bottling plants have stocks ranging between four to five days and with the strike entering its fourth day, there was every possibility of those plants going dry if the strike continued, the sources said.

The sources said that Gautam Dutta, the state level coordinator had apprised the state government of the prevailing situation arising out of the strike.

The strikers were also not allowing the tankers, which have reached the bottling plants, to be unloaded.

There were 11 LPG plants in the state of which six belonged to the IOC while Bharat Petroleum has three and Hindustan Petroleum two.

As part of its contingency plan, production at IOC's bottling plant at Kalyani, which was fed by the Railways, would be increased besides another plant in Haldia refinery.

The Bulk Transporters' Federation has called the strike in protest against some clauses in the tender issued by the industry for hiring tankers.