UP fuel supply tight? Demand growth and LPG delays to emerge in three weeks

LUCKNOW: While the State Level Coordinator (SLC) of the Oil Marketing Corporation (OMC) continues to insist that supply of petroleum products in Uttar Pradesh is “completely normal and controlled”, a comparison of two official statements issued on April 6 and April 27 shows that the system, especially LPG logistics, is facing new pressure as demand for petrol rises sharply.On April 6, SLC Sanjay Bhandari said the average daily supply of petrol was 160 million liters of petrol and 30 million liters of diesel. By April 27, gasoline use had increased to 20 million liters per day, indicating a sharp rise in demand in just three weeks. Diesel supply has also increased to 33 million liters per day, reinforcing the trend of increasing fuel consumption.A statement released by the SLC said: “The state has 13,168 operational retail outlets supported by 28 supply stations. The fuel situation is stable and retail supply is in line with normal consumption trends.”Likewise, the SLC continues to be confident about LPG stock supplies, but the segment reveals a more worrying shift. On April 6, dealers were holding about 1.5 days of inventory, while OMCs were replenishing an average of 8.70 lakh LPG units per day. The backlog of LPG to be replenished is approximately 4.5 days.As of April 27, dealer-level inventory has dropped to 1.3 days. At the same time, average daily LPG supply dropped to about 800,000 refills.What is more noteworthy is that the backlog of LPG waiting to be filled has increased to about 6 days, indicating that clearance is still slow despite ongoing daily monitoring and prioritization by important sectors such as hospitals, defence, railways and food processing units.Although SLC Sanjay Bhandari reiterated that LPG supply remains “completely stable” and as per the Government of India guidelines, the current allocation level of commercial LPG remains at 68%.The SLC statement on Monday also issued a stronger public appeal, specifically urging residents of several border and eastern UP districts, including Siddharth Nagar, Maharajganj, Bahraich, Ballia, Balrampur, Kushinagar, Basti and Lakhimpur Kheri, not to panic or over-buy and not to believe rumours, which was less evident in the April 6 statement.