More than 2000 petrol pumps to come up in 2009

New Delhi, July 9 (ANI): Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Jatin Prasad, today informed the Lok Sabha that the 2,263 petrol pumps would be set up during the current financial year by the Indian Oil, the Bharat Petroleum and the Hindustan Petroleum.

Prasad told the members that at present Indian Oil Corp (IOC) the largest number of petrol pumps at 18,140 while the Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) has 8,539 and the Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) has 8,389 petrol pumps in the country.

Of the 35,068 petrol pumps owned by the state-run companies, the maximum 4,262 are in Uttar Pradesh followed by Tamil Nadu with 2,962, Andhra Pradesh has 2,921 Punjab has 2,652 petrol pumps, Rajasthan 2,343 and Karnataka has 2,260 pertrol pumps, Prasad informed the house.

Replying to a separate question, Prasad said three firms have expressed their willingness to set up to set up 14 more liquid petroleum gas (LPG) bottling plants in the country.

As on April 1, 2009, the three firms were operating 182 LPG bottling plants with a total bottling capacity of 8.9 million tonnes per annum. Of the new bottling plants, four will come up in Maharashtra, two each in Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu and one each in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka. (ANI)