MRPL shuts down refinery completely due to water shortage

April 19, 2012

mrplMangalore/New Delhi, April 19: Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL) has completely shutdown its 15 million tons a year refinery following shortage of water.

"We had been operating the plant at one-third of the capacity since April 13. The continuing water shortage forced us to take complete shutdown of the refinery now," MRPL Managing Director Uttam Kumar Basu informed media persons in New Delhi.

Meanwhile, the company has approached the Karnataka High Court seeking direction to local authorities for immediately releasing 2.5 million gallons of water per day from the neighbouring Nethravathi river.

"We have prayed to the Hon'ble court that the calculations done by local authorities in withdrawing water supply to Mangalore refinery are flawed. They have not factored in the inflow and so we have prayed for immediate release of water for us to begin operations," he said.

Basu said MRPL has declared "force majeaure" at the refinery and all shipments except those to Mauritius, which relies on India for meeting its fuel needs, will be affected.

Crude oil imports have been stopped as the company already had a huge inventory, he said MRPL begin shuting down different units on Tuesday and currently only crude distillation unit (CDU) was operational.

"CDU too is now being shutdown," he said.

MRPL, a subsidiary of state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC), received around 5.5 million gallons of water daily from Nethravathi river.

Water availability in the Nethravathi river and its downstream dams started depleting from the end of March and the refinery is not getting any supplies currently, he said.

"As a result the district authorities enforced reduction of water supply to MRPL to one-third level and finally on April 11, 2012, completely stopped the intake of water from the Nethravathi river," he said.

Mangalore refinery has three crude units -- Phase I of 4.68 million tonnes, Phase II of 7.14 million tonnes and Phase III of 3 million tonnes -- and supplies oil products in southern states.

From April 13, it had shutdown Phase-II and III and now it has closed even Phase-I.

The shutdown would lead to shortage of supply of products to MRPL fed locations.


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coastaldigest.com news network
May 17,2020

Bengaluru, May 17: Amidst mounting demand form Kannadigas across the world for repatriation flights in the wake of covid-19 lockdown, Dr Arathi Krishna, former Deputy Chairman of the NRI Forum of Karnataka government, has written to Hardeep Singh Puri Minister of Civil Aviation to operate more special flights to Gulf repatriate Kannadigas from gulf countries. 

Dr Arathi Krishna’s first request in the letter was to add flights from Kuwait, Bahrain and Jeddah to Bengaluru as many (from Karnataka) are stranded in these cities in precarious situations.

In addition, she also requested for a couple of flights from Dammam and Riyadh to Bengaluru as there are more than 3780 Kannadigas registered to return from Saudi Arabia and members of Bearys Chamber of Commerce and Industry are requesting the same. Any number of flights from Dubai to Bengaluru and Mangaluru will also help the stranded people, the letter stated. 

“Old and sick people, pregnant women and others are in urgent need to connect with the world are looking up to you for getting flights from different comers of the world. Indian communities are hopeful that you will use your position to help them to get the much needed mobility at this time,” the letter stated. 

She also said that the people in Karnataka are grateful to you (Mr Hardeep Singh Puri) for adding two flights from Dubai to Bengaluru in the last two schedules and one flight each from Riyadh, Dammam, Muscat and Doha.

Dr Arathi Krishna is currently serving as the Chairman of the NRI Cell of Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee and Secretary of Indian Overseas Congress.

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coastaldigest.com news network
January 31,2020

Mangaluru, Jan 31: The Pumpwell flyover, part of the four-laning of Talapady-Kundapura stretch of National Highway 66, was finally inaugurated today.

Work on four-laning NH 66 between Talapady-Kundapur, excluding the Nanthoor-NITK Surathkal stretch, started in September 2010 and Pumpwell (Mahaveera Circle) flyover was a part of the project. Concessionnaire M/s Navayuga Udupi Tollway Pvt., Ltd., failed to execute many flyovers on the stretch within the prescribed time, including Thokkottu and Pumpwell in Mangaluru, Karavali Circle in Udupi, and Shasri Circle in Kundapur.

Thokkottu and Karavali Circle flyovers are complete now while Shastri Circle flyover as well as the four-lane road within Kundapur town are still incomplete. Similarly, a small bridge and portion of the road in Padubidri too is yet to be completed.

District in-charge minister Kota Srinivas Pojjary and MP Nalin Kumar Kateel inaugurated the long-pending Flyover

MLA Vedavayas Kamath, MLA Bharath Shetty were also present on the occasion.

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News Network
January 24,2020

Bengaluru, Jan 24: Karnataka High Court on Friday ordered notice to the state government and self-styled godman Swami Nithyananda while hearing a petition seeking cancellation of bail granted to him.

A petition was filed in the Karnataka High Court on Friday seeking cancellation of bail granted to Nithyananda for skipping the trial and fleeing the country.

Justice John Michael Cunha, after hearing the complainant, ordered issuance of notice to the state government and Nithyananda and posted the matter for hearing next week.

The petition, filed by K Lenin, alleged that Nithyananda has been skipping trial and has fled the country on an expired passport.

The plea further said that Nithyananda was making false representations in his "exemption petitions to the trial court as if he is still in India".

Interpol has also issued a 'blue corner notice' to locate the self-styled godman, who is facing trial in a criminal case, on the request of Gujarat Police. 

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