Cooking gas supplies to nine districts, disrupted for the third day on Saturday, has been restored partially and the supply is likely to be normal on Monday as more lorries are expected to reach the BPCL bottling facility at Ambalamugal with cleaners on board.
Around 35 lorries took delivery on Saturday meaning that about 40 per cent of the production at the bottling facility was evacuated, said a transporter.
All the lorries arrived with cleaners and lorry drivers have been asked to bring workers of their choice provided they had identity cards to prove their age.
The district labour authority will convene a meeting of the striking lorry drivers, company management, and transport contractors on Monday afternoon. The issue of providing cleaners for lorries is expected to be resolved at the meeting, said a contractor.
Lorry drivers are demanding that cleaners be appointed on a permanent basis. However, transporters have alleged that the drivers have been “harassing” the cleaners with a view to pocketing their pay. But a lorry driver, speaking also for the others, denied the allegation.
He said the transport contractors had been avoiding cleaners to cut cost. Even the Rs. 375 paid to the cleaners was measly considering that the work involved was almost a 24-hour job, said the lorry driver.
LPG from the BPCL bottling plant near here was used in nine districts – Ernakulam, Alappuzha, Kottayam, Idukki, Thrissur, Palakkad, Kozhikode, Malappuram and Wayanad. Many of the trips involved upwards of 10 hours and the payment to the cleaners was insufficient to make it attractive, he added.
The LPG bottling plant sends out about 90 loads a day. Each normal load comprises 306 domestic cylinders though larger lorries carry 450 cylinders.
With the festival of Vishu around the corner, there has been pressure on the authorities to avoid any lag in supply of cooking gas.
