Fuel adulteration scam: All clean, says forensic report; UP cops in a spot

MEERUT: Days after local police exposed an alleged vehicular fuel adulteration scam in the city and even “sealed” three petrol pumps, the forensic report of adulterated fuel samples collected from these pumps, accessed exclusively by the TOI, has given a clean chit to the petrol pump owners. Not just that, the report found nothing wrong with the solvent found in the godown of the stockiest, which was raided by the police.The godown owner, Rajesh Jain, who owns Paras Petro Chemicals, is currently in jail and police have slapped the stringent National Security Act (NSA) on him.There is outrage among petrol pump owners after the report.Mukesh Jain, owner of three petrol pumps which were forced to stop operations for more than 10 hours on August 20, told TOI, “Police had no right to seal our pumps. They could have taken the samples and waited for the report. But the cops seemed to be in a hurry to pronounce us guilty. The oil companies’ mobile labs conduct sampling of petrol and diesel 2-3 times in a month. We have documentary evidence. We knew the forensic report would exonerate us, but the raid did harm our reputation.”Police, however, maintained that the forensic report was misleading.Superintendent of police (rural) Avinash Pandey, who is heading the SIT constituted in the case, said, “The report is misleading in many ways. We have sent a fresh letter to provide us with detailed inputs. It seems that the forensic labs did not conduct the tests the way they should have.”On August 20, a police raid was conducted in Partapur region where more than 2 lakh litres of “adulterants/solvent” was seized from two firms.Following this, several petrol pumps were raided. Police had also recovered an orange-coloured dye which was allegedly mixed with the solvent for adulteration in petrol and diesel, from Rajesh Jain’s firm.In all, 10 persons were booked, including Rajesh Jain and Pradeep Gupta, who owns Ganpati Petrochem. All of them, except Rajesh Jain, are out on bail.