RAWALPINDI: All Pakistan CNG Association on Sunday said the government should reject the proposal forwarded by Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) to increase the tariff of natural gas by Rs200 to Rs300 per mmbtu.

The proposal, if accepted, will damage the industrial sector and devastate the CNG sector which is already facing problems. It will also open floodgates of inflation, it said.

During the last 27 years, gas tariff was not hiked as much as in the recent time and yet another increase is on the cards, said Ghiyas Abdullah Paracha, the central chairman of the association, in a statement.

He said costly gas will hit the transport sector, public transport fares would be increased, millions of businesses will face a new challenge, the overall cost of doing business will witness an increase and the citizens will come under more stress.

Mr Paracha said owners of three million cars running on CNG will also feel the pain of increased gas tariff while air pollution will rise which has already crossed safe limits in many cities.

He noted that the economic friendly fuel was being encouraged all across the globe but it was otherwise in Pakistan and whenever the CNG sector started moving towards stability it was damaged through subsidies.

Gas sector circular debt has reached hundreds of billions of rupees while gas companies have not received almost Rs50 billion from RLNG consumers which would be shifted to other sectors.

He said frequent closure of the CNG sector also added to the losses of the government.

He said the government should immediately issue guidelines for the regulator and gas companies otherwise the gas sector will sink in the circular debt which is piling up rapidly.

Published in Dawn, January 20th, 2020