Fuelling Doubts.

Most people own vehicles, and if you guys don’t know most of these vehicles run on petrol (gasoline) or diesel. Petroleum business is one of the most lucrative businesses, especially with petroleum being one of the most important materials required to run the whole planet. Thanks to various contraptions made by genius humans, which requires energy to function/operate. Most of the energy is supplied by fossil fuels, among which petroleum is the major source of energy. So, due to obvious reasons, petroleum is a major factor which governs the global economic and political balance.

Now forget the first paragraph. I just wrote it for the sake of writing as I wanted to make it sound important. I’m just writing about an observation I made in the recent days. As we all know, the major players in our country are three PSUs – Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IOCL) Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) and Bharath Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) along with other private and international players like Reliance Petroleum, Shell, Total and few other companies. We can see a lot of petrol pumps or filling stations spread all over the country, most of them are owned by these public sector oil companies. These are the same PSUs who constantly keep on whining that they are running in loss looking for excuses to increase the prices. I seriously don’t believe that they are losing money or they were ever running under loss.

Based upon my experience, I have found that the quality of service provided by these international players, especially Shell Petroleum is a lot better compared to other players. I have personally found that whenever I fill my bike’s tank at Shell, the mileage I get is higher compared for the same quantity of fuel filled at other HPCL, BPCL or IOCL stations. One more surprising thing: The fuel is cheaper at Shell filling stations as compared to other pumps and they also issue bills for every sale..!!

All these factors make me wonder about the quality of fuel supplied by our country’s petroleum companies. My guess: Either the petrol in these pumps is adulterated or the pumps are not calibrated properly. Either way, we end up losing, or at least I feel I am losing … And not to forget the price and bills… I can’t get this feeling of being cheated out of my mind…!!