City Gas Distribution (CGD) networks will soon cover 72 per cent of the country’s population, said Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas & Steel Dharmendra Pradhan.
Pradhan dedicated 48 CNG stations to the nation and inaugurated eight other CNG stations on Friday.
These 56 stations are spread over 11 States/Union Territories — Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, New Delhi, Punjab, Rajasthan, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh, and belong to 11 different entities — public as well private, an official statement said.
Completion of work at these stations was affected due to the countrywide lockdown. However, after easing of restrictions last month, the work gathered pace and was carried out ensuring all safety and social distancing norms, the statement said.
This ensured minimum delay in commissioning of these stations as against the original schedule.
With the addition of these stations to the CNG network, the daily filling capacity in the country has gone up by over 50,000 vehicles, the statement added. Pradhan said that the government is working on energy efficiency, affordability, security and accessibility.
He said soon, customers will have to go to only one place, where all types of fuels — Petrol, diesel, CNG, LNG and LPG — will be made available.
Mobile fuel dispensers
He said that the government has already started mobile dispensers for diesel, and would like to expand it to petrol and LNG.
Pradhan said that people would be able to get fuel delivered at their homes in future.