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Petrol pump dealers continue to suffer as sales fail to pick up

Demand for fuel is not picking up fast as people are not keen on getting out of their homes like before. Hubballi: Though the lockdown has been eased to restart the engines of the economy, petrol pumps in Hubballi-Dharwad are witnessing a drop in sales by around 50%.

Sales have slightly improved from lockdown 1.0 to 4.0 but business is not picking up at the expected level.
The state has 5,800 PSU fuel stations including HPCL, IOCL and BPCL as per Karnataka State Federation of Petroleum Dealers.

Many dealers are facing a financial crunch as regular expenditure and bank loan interest will burn their pockets, said GV Hiregoudar, a petrol pump owner in Haveri.

Demand for fuel is not picking up fast as people are not keen on getting out of their homes like before. There are restrictions on movement between 7pm and 7am and movement is completely banned on Sundays. This is the main reason for sales not taking off, said Veeranna Sajjanar, vice-president, Dharwad District Petroleum Association (DDPA).

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He said he used to sell 10,000 litres of fuel every day before the lockdown but now daily sales have come down to 5,000 litres.

Ashwin Kotambari, secretary of Karnataka State Federation of Petroleum Dealers, said, “Reduction in sales has broken the chain of rotation. Owners have fixed expenditures like salary of the staff, electricity, maintenance and others. So, if we used to place an order, say in 10 days for fuel, now it takes 15 or 20 days to place fresh orders. This is causing additional burden on the owners.”

Shantraj Pol, president of DDPA, said that since trade and businesses have not resumed properly and many offices have asked their employees to continue to work from home, movement of vehicles is still restricted. Schools and colleges are closed.

Tourism sector has suffered a severe blow. All these factors have affected our sector, he said. However, he expressed confidence that economy will begin to look up after June 1.


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