The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday criticised Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister M Veerappa Moily's proposal to shut down petrol pumps from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. to check fuel demand.
Reacting sharply, BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar said: "Government has lost sense of proportion, closing petrol pump at night is it the way of lowering petrol consumption?.
"Government is in confusion, doesn't know what to do, if petrol pumps are closed at night, queues during the day will be longer," Javadekar said.
"Doing this will only worsen the economic situation in the country," BJP leader Yashwant Sinha told media here.
"Present situation in country can only be termed as economic emergency," he added.
Moily on Sunday said his ministry was planning to prohibit fuels pumps from staying open at night as part of the government's plan to check fuel consumption in the country.
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Moily also urged people to take some austerity steps to conserve fuel, and added that the economy can be saved from deterioration if people cooperate and conserve petroleum.
"The consumption of petroleum should be conserved. We need to adopt some austerity measures. The people should cooperate with us. We are importing 80 percent of the petroleum in terms of dollar. Investors are investing in dollar, so dollar price is going up. Petroleum companies have lost 80 thousand crores in the recent times," he said.
"We want to create an opportunity to conserve petrol during this crisis. People should take some austerity steps to save petrol. Only then the economy can be saved. If I can save 25 billion dollars in terms of reduction of import, I will be adding one percent to the GDP. By conserving the oil energy by the people, the GPD will become 5.5 percent and this will change the economy of the country," he added.
Oil companies on Saturday hiked the price of petrol by Rs. 2.35 per litre and diesel by 50 paise per litre.
This is the sixth hike in petrol prices in two months, whereas the prices of diesel have been hiked eight times since January 17.