By Anilkumar T
Published: 21st January 2015 06:00 AM
KAKKANAD: As many as 2.7 lakh LPG customers in the district are on the verge of missing out on the gas subsidy as the deadline for linking bank account is going to expire within ten days. According to the data obtained from the three oil companies mainly HPCL, IOC and BPCL only 6,47,616 out of 9,25,166 LPG customers in the district have linked their bank account to get the subsidy.
“We have been asking customers since last year to link their bank account and Aadhaar card to the LPG number. Promotions via SMS, newspaper advertisements and other sources have been repeatedly carried out to make the customers aware, but they have shown lukewarm response to it. If these 2,77,549 customers fail to link their account by January 31 they may not get a second chance,” said a top official of an oil company.
It was after getting poor response to their awareness campaigns that the oil companies and the administration decided to set January 31 as the deadline to get the attention of the consumer and hence speed up the process.
The customers should approach the banks and their LPG dealers to get their account linked using form 1 and 2 and those who do not posses Aadhaar cards will have to use form 3 and 4. The forms can also be downloaded from www.mylpg.in.
“Earlier, there had been some confusion about the whole process of linking the Aadhaar with LPG during the initial days of BJP government. However, the issue got settled after two or three cabinet meetings. Since then we have been urging our customers to link their bank accounts and Aadhaar to get the LPG subsidy. But the lukewarm response shown by the customers forced us to fix a deadline,” the officials said.
Ernakulam shows a poor turnout of just 70.3 percent enrolled and is followed in the dismal show by Idukki and Trivandrum districts with 64.13 and 70.23 percent respectively. Waynad district stands first with 95 percent enrollment. Pathanamthitta district comes second with 89%. Alappuzha-76.80%, Kollam-76.20%, Kozhikode-75.80%, Kasaragod-72.80%, Palakkad-73.63%, Kottayam-74.37%, Malappuram- 75.17% and Thrissur-75.37%.
“Compared to other districts the number of distributors in Ernakulam is 74. Other districts have below 50. Though we have arranged facilities at all these gas agencies and banks people are not utilising the opportunity,” an official said.
“To overcome this crisis we have started an ‘oil gas conservation fortnight drive’ from January 15 in the district to spread awareness about the precautions to be taken while using petroleum products. We will also ask them to link their LPG account with the bank during the mass drive.
The main aim of this process is to filter out people using multiple gas connections. If customers who wait till the last day to rush to the bank to link their accounts may have to leave disappointed,” official added.