Science and Technology Minister Batty Weerakoon yesterday in Parliament accused Shell Gas Company for reducing the quantity of gas in the normal cylinder charging that the company was acting fraudulently.

The company claimed that the reduction in quantity was on a standards directive issued by the Sri Lanka Standards Institute (SLSI).

But Minister Weerakoon blamed Shell Gas for fraudulently placing the responsibility on the SLSI for the recent reduction in quantity. He questioned the company why it has failed to carry out the quantity standards when the SLSI issued the directive in June 1998.

"If they were merely following SLSI standards, why did they wait for over two-and-a-half years to do it? The SLSI set these standards in June 1998 but the company paid no heed to it. It kept filling at 13.4 kilograms despite knowing that the SLSI had set the quantity at 12 kilograms. Suddenly along with the price hike this year, Shell decided to follow the standards and blamed the SLSI very fraudulently" he alleged.

Minister Weerakoon also said that SLSI was never required to look into standards of filling or quantity when the monopoly was given. "Now Shell is cheating the consumers when it claims it is merely following SLSI standards in bringing the quantity down" he charged.

UNP member Tilak Karunaratne said he had information that Shell Gas is trying to raise prices again and stated that this should receive the attention of the Trade Ministry and the Fair Trade Commission.

Minister Batty Weerakoon told Parliament that he would look in to regulations that should be brought in to protect the rights of the consumers.

However, the five year monopoly enjoyed by Shell Gas Lanka would come to an end by the end of this year as announced by President Kumaratunga during her Budget Speech on February 14.

Consumers are expected to benefit from increased competition when the Shell Gas monopoly ends. Shell was granted a five-year monopoly under the terms of the deal that led to the company's privatisation in 1995.

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