ISLAMABAD: A single member bench of the Islamabad High Court (IHC), comprising Justice Athar Minallah, ordered the Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Limited (SNGPL) to submit gas load management plan for industry and CNG sector in the court.
The court was hearing identical petitions of 314 CNG stations of Potohar region.
The petitioners submitted to the court that the Petroleum Ministry was committing discrimination against CNG sector by supply gas to other industries and suspending supply to the sector. They said that the discrimination was not only unconstitutional, but a violation of fundamental rights. It was on December 04 when the same IHC bench while directing SNGPL not to disconnect the connections of 314 CNG gas stations, had sought reply from the ministry of petroleum and natural resources.
The counsels for SNGPL Ali Rukh and Hafeezullah Yaqoob informed the court that the prevailing situation was as result of the huge gap in demand and supply. He said that the SNGPL had a priority list and the first priority was domestic consumers.
They said that under the contract the CNG station owners signed while applying for the gas connections; the SNGPL had the right to interrupt supply of gas to them at any time. The counsels said that the gas load management issue had already been discussed by the IHC Justice Riaz Ahmed Khan in 2011 on the identical petitions. However, Justice Athar Minallah directed the MD SNGPL to submit gas load management plan for CNG and industrial sector.
