Now that the state-owned Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company is on a country-wide drive to snap illegal gas connections, the dark irony one must not miss is, who is trying to prevail on whom? The present exercise of Titas more than exemplifies the starkly scathing message in the well known Bangla proverb - shorsher modhhey bhut, implying the futility of actions when offenders are in charge of dispensing with offences. One must ask why in the first place Titas has launched the drive. Is it for easing the run-down gas distribution system by stopping the criminality of illegal connections? Ideally, the on-going drive should be prompted by such pious intent. But can the Titas authorities justify this moral stand and assure the citizens of the virtues of their actions?
Fresh gas connections were put on hold by the government for around five years due mainly to inadequate supplies, coupled with infrastructure-related constraints. The embargo was lifted last year but to everyone's surprise, it transpired that despite that, gas connections to households and even industrial units in and around the capital were selectively available. The problem for the authorities then was to legitimise those illegal connections before contemplating on fresh connections. It seemed as though the authorities, far from taking punitive actions, were more duty-bound to give legitimacy to the wrongdoings. Further surprising was the fact that the number of illegal connections was more than the fresh connections that were being planned. It emerged from reports in the media that more than 150,000 illegal connections were given during the last five years when the activity remained officially suspended. The authorities termed it a misdeed by 'a section of dishonest officials and workers' of the state-owned gas company who, as alleged, provided those gas connections in connivance with influential quarters.
So, it was not a criminal gang outside the rank and file of Titas who accomplished the task by surreptitiously digging the earth at dead of night to lay transmission pipes. One wonders how it was possible for the Titas functionaries to plunge into this elaborate 'project' for years! It has further been reported that the decision to remove all illegal gas connections was taken at the Titas board meeting in early February, and the drive commenced on February 16. Titas sources were quoted as stating that so far, 33,000 feet of illegal gas connections were removed in the capital and in some of the adjoining locations. Reports say that the work done is only a portion of what remains to be done, provided the authorities are earnest in completing the job.
What the Titas drive - taken up willingly or not -- has unravelled, is one of the worst examples of the long, wicked hand of corruption tearing into the already tethered veins of governance that the country's civil society is so fond of correcting. The Titas drive may have its successes, albeit under pressure. However, it does not explain the adage that there is an end to everything. If all wrongdoings are to reach their ends to be stopped, one has but only to wait for staging of the ending.
Connection and disconnection of illegal gas lines
FE Team | Published: February 26, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2026 06:01:00
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