KARACHI: A day after the Sindh Assembly adopted a resolution asking the federal government to act against the installation of sub-standard CNG kits and cylinders in public transport vehicles, the Sindh High Court on Friday issued notices to a number of officials and regulatory bodies in a public interest litigation.
A division bench, comprising Chief Justice Mushir Alam and Justice Ahmed Ali M Sheikh, was hearing an application filed by a concerned citizen, Israr Ahmed, who maintained that more than 150 people were burnt alive in different incidents involving CNG cylinders and kits fitted in public transport vehicles. The petitioner requested the court to direct the home secretaries of all the four provinces to remove all sub-standard, low quality CNG kits and cylinders from public transport vehicles. He also sought the direction to the federal ministry of petroleum and natural resources and departments concerned to put in place a proper mechanism for the import, production and installation of CNG kits and cylinders. He also pleaded for all unauthorised CNG conversion centres to be closed down as they have mushroomed all over the country and are compromising on safety standards to make a quick buck.
After hearing the counsel for the petitioner, the bench ordered notices to be issued to all the people named in the petition at a date to be fixed later. They include the federal secretary of petroleum and natural resources, the home secretaries of Sindh, Punjab, Khyber-Pakhtunkhawa and Balochistan, the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra), Sui Southern Gas Company, Hydrocarbon Development Institute of Pakistan.
The same bench heard another petition, filed by Al Makkah-Madina CNG filling station in Sujawal that has questioned the permission granted to CNG station Kangore.
Al Makkah-Madina maintained that Ogra and the petroleum ministry were violating the prime minister’s order of January 16, 2008 in which granting licences and connections to applicants, who have yet to import machinery for CNG stations, was ordered to be held in abeyance.
The new connections were also stalled but in the name of the renewal of licenses and Ogra issued a number of connections, allegedly for heavy bribes, the petitioner maintained, adding that these connections would add to the loadshedding of natural gas in the province.
The petitioner also alleged that despite a ban on shifting CNG stations from one district to another in this case, a CNG station was shifted from Shikarpur to Sujawal, Thatta district.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 24th, 2011.
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