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ONGC blowout exposes India's chronic oil safety failures

With abandoned homes, polluted landscapes, and reliance on foreign crisis teams, India’s oil sector must urgently overhaul its safety protocols and enforce accountability.

By The Assam Tribune
ONGC blowout exposes Indias chronic oil safety failures
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The gas leak from the ONGC well in Sivasagar steps into its seventh day on Wednesday (AT Photo)

After the local people endured 16 days of ordeal, the gas blowout in the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC)-owned gas well in Sivasagar district has finally been capped successfully. But the aftermath has left the landscape and the atmosphere polluted, houses abandoned, and, of course, many disturbing questions unanswered.

Credible analysis of the blowout has raised serious concerns over violations of safety protocol as also on the competence and professionalism of the private firm engaged by ONGC in particular and the lopsided functioning of ONGC in general. As industry veterans have pointed out, even standard practices concerning safety mechanisms for prevention of blowouts were overlooked or completely ignored.

It is apparent that the preparedness of the private operator left a lot to be desired, but ONGC too is guilty of adopting a rather cavalier approach towards the overall operation of the oil well. Also stands exposed by the blowout is ONGC's complete lack of blowout-fighting preparedness.

All efforts put in by the public sector oil major could do little to bring some semblance of control over the massive emission of gas for two weeks. It was only after the intervention of a special crisis management team that was roped in from the US that the gas well could be ultimately capped.

We have a very long history of oil exploration and yet we are invariably caught on the wrong foot when a disaster strikes. It is probably time we gave some serious thought into improving our own expertise in fighting disasters of this kind. Such situations of extreme emergency warrant interventions to be put in place on a war footing something conspicuous by absence whenever such a calamity strikes.

The memories of the Baghjan oil well blowout which had ravaged a large area killing many people, destroying property and severely impacting a biodiversity-rich wetland and a part of the Dibru Saikhowa National Park is still fresh in public memory. Unfortunately, even that catastrophic calamity has apparently failed to sensitize the authorities into taking prompt and effective action to deal with such disasters.

Given the propensity of oil installations to trigger hazardous situations, the authorities should go the extra mile to pre-empt, prevent and control disasters. But experience has shown that things are taken in a shockingly cavalier manner by operators of such hazardous industries.

On the whole, an overhaul of the safety measures - including their installation, maintenance and monitoring -merits urgent attention by both oil PSUs and the government.

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