The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas has brought in an amendment to its Liquefied Petroleum Gas (Regulation of Supply and Distribution) Order 2000 making the Unique Identification Number (UID) under the Aadhaar project must for availing LPG refills.
The move is aimed at preventing multiple connections and availing cylinders in third party name and to clean up the LPG consumer base, as the government was spending heavily on subsidising the domestic LPG cylinders.
With people not showing keen interest in availing the UID or Aadhaar cards, the move of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Ministry is expected to increase the enrolment for Aadhaar.
The Ministry in its circular dated October 13, 2011 has announced the amendment to the LPG Regulation of Supply and Distribution order 2011. The Ministry's decision to make Petroleum Corporations sensitise distributors on Aadhaar card for availing refills has been published in the Gazette of India vide notification dated September 26.
The order has come into effect from the date of publication of the gazette notification.
The decision to make Aadhaar UID mandatory has been taken by exercising powers conferred under Section 3 of the Essential Commodities Act of 1955 (10 of 1955).
The amended order reads as follows: No distributor of a Government Oil Company shall supply LPG cylinder to any household unless the head of such a household furnishes Aadhaar number of each member of his or her household to the distributor within three months from the date of notification of such area.
Notification of such area means an area notified for enrolment for availing Aadhaar number. Many major towns in Western Tamil Nadu came under Aadhaar enrolment notification in June and July of 2011.
Officials of the Oil Corporations in Western Tamil Nadu when contacted said that distributors had been asked to sensitise consumers on the need for availing the Aadhar number at the earliest for availing uninterrupted supply of LPG refill.
Consumers will be given reasonable time to comply with the directive.
