CHENNAI: It was a Manic Monday for motorists of Chennai who tried to get fuel for their vehicles. As crowds braved the blazing heat in serpentine queues, it was the perfect setting for drama. While at some petrol pumps there were incidents of small-scale violence, the scene was tense in others, even as the impasse continued through the day, throwing schedules and tempers way off track.Office-goers and those attending to emergencies had little option but to stay with the throng. With vehicles all around them, there was no way they could leave the queue. Practically every petrol pump that had stock did business under the watchful eyes of policemen who stood guard, just in case tempers got out of hand.“I waited at least 90 minutes in the sun to get petrol in the forenoon. I could wait no longer and, luckily, I was at the end of the queue. So, I just went to work. But my tank is nearly dry and I have to get petrol somehow,” said a motorcyclist at a petrol pump close to the Adyar Bridge.Tempers on short fuse were on full display at a pump in Vadapalani, with one of the men in the queue begging those around him to let him get ahead as a family member had been taken to the hospital in emergency. But his pleas were met with nothing but apathy and distrust by those around him. “We too have urgent work. Can’t you see we are all waiting? Stay in line,” a fellow motorist told the pleading man.The situation even came to fisticuffs at some places. Policemen were seen breaking up a scuffle at a petrol pump opposite Adyar Bus Depot.
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