Petrol station employee shot, critical

A petrol pump employee was in critical condition Monday after three men on a motorcycle shot him when he refused to fill up fuel as they were without safety helmets.

Lal Singh was taken to a Delhi hospital after one of the three men on a motorcycle opened fire after he enforced official orders that fuel cannot be given to two-wheelers whose riders are without helmets.

The incident occurred at Banthala in Ghaziabad town, close to Delhi.

When the three insisted that he sell them petrol, he refused saying at least one of them should be with a helmet.

Furious, the three forcibly took petrol from the fuel station and then shot the employee before escaping.

Lal Singh was taken to the Guru Tegh Bahadur Hospital in Delhi with bullet wounds. His condition was critical, a police source said.

Police have registered a case of attempt to murder and are hunting for the three men, officer Gorakh Nath Yadav said.

The Ghaziabad Petrol Pump Dealers' Association said the administration's orders to petrol stations not to sell fuel to scooters and motorcycles if their riders were minus helmets had become "very problematic".

Association president Prem Mohan Singhal said: "Our salesmen are suffering. They are beaten, mistreated... Lal Singh is critical. His bone has been fractured.

"The Association is taking care of his treatment. We demand that the district administration should take up the responsibility of his medical care," Singhal told IANS.

Singhal said the association had urged police to provide guards at every petrol station. "But no policeman has been provided at any pump."

He said the situation had become so critical that some petrol pumps were keeping helmets which are offered to two-wheeler riders who come without helmets.

"After this shooting incident, we want the administration to withdraw such arbitrary orders immediately. The employees at the petrol pumps are threatening to quit work." - IANS