The blame for the petrol excise fiasco has been passed on to the petroleum ministry. And it has accepted it without question.
Minister of state for petroleum and natural gas Santosh Kumar Gangwar has gone on television to apologise for the inconvenience to the petrol-consuming public when they had to pay for the excise hike, which, the finance ministry now claims, was not meant to be passed on to the consumer.
If there was any doubt that this was a mere apology and not an acceptance of blame for the faux pas, Gangwar promptly removed it by declaring that an inquiry had been ordered to fix responsibility. Naturally, Gangwar can order an inquiry within his own ministry and not in the all-powerful finance ministry. Therefore, the "culprit" will have to be found within the petroleum ministry.
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In the 1998-99 Union budget, finance minister Yashwant Sinha had announced an increase in excise duty on petrol from 20 to 35 per cent. However, following an outcry over the price hike, the next day Sinha denied the increased duty was meant to be passed on to the consumer. He blamed officials for the "mistake".
Gangwar has been drawn into the controversy for no fault of his. His senior minister, K Ramamurthy, had to leave for an official tour on the morning of June 1, the day the Union budget was presented. In his absence, Gangwar had to sign the notification directing oil companies to pass on the duty hike to consumers.
To ward off the mounting political embarrassment, the government started looking for a scapegoat and Gangwar was made to face an angry Cabinet that laid the entire blame on the doorsteps of the petroleum ministry. Being new to the game and thrown among political heavyweights, Gangwar meekly accepted all the charges and promised to extend an apology to the public.
But the question remains who in the petroleum ministry will now be made the scapegoat. While many names are doing the rounds, it is unlikely that any senior official will be hauled up. The search is reportedly on for a middle-level official connected with the pricing of petroleum products. As punishment, he might be either transferred to one of the public sector oil companies or given a letter of warning. The petroleum ministry is as keen to close the chapter as the finance ministry which is bracing itself to handle a somewhat similar embarrassment over the urea price hike.