By IANS,
Palanpur (Gujarat) : Four members of an interstate gang have been arrested for pilfering crude oil from the Salaya-Mathura pipeline of state-owned IndianOil Corporation, police here said Wednesday.
Eight more gang members were likely to be nabbed soon, Banaskantha district police chief D.N. Patel said.
“The gang has been active since last September and the involvement of some Indian Oil employees too cannot be ruled out,” sub-inspector J.B. Chavda, who is investigating the case, told IANS.
Chavda said the racket came to light after one of the culprits was held Sunday. Three others were then nabbed the next day. All four were remanded to eight-day police custody Wednesday.
They have admitted to selling as many as 55 tankers, each containing 20,000 litres of crude oil worth over Rs.4.1 million, he said.
Chavda said M. Rajendran, executive manager of the Siddhpur-based IndianOil storage depot, had lodged a police complaint after noticing that the pipeline had been tampered with near Hebatpur, seven km from here and about 200 km north of Ahmedabad.
The 1,870-km long pipeline runs from Salaya near Vadinar in Jamnagar district in Gujarat to IndianOil refineries at Koyali (Gujarat), Mathura (Uttar Pradesh) and Panipat (Haryana) transporting crude.