Children participate in the contest Indira Gandhi Park in Bhubaneswar. Picture by Sanjib Mukherjee

Bhubaneswar, Jan. 16: Oil marketing companies under the aegis of ministry of petroleum and natural gas conducted a painting competition school children today as part of the Oil and Gas Conservation Fortnight (OGCF) that is being celebrated from January 15 to 31.

Titled “Save fuel yaani save money” the competition was held at the Indira Gandhi Park. Nearly 150 students from various schools from across the city participated in it. “The number of vehicles is on the verge of outnumbering the city population. More vehicles lead to greater use of fuel and more expenditure. The need of the hour is to conserve the non-renewable resources such as petroleum and natural gas,” said Abhishek Satpathy, a Class VII student of D.M. School. Another Class V student of St. Joseph’s High School, Arpita Sharma, said the price of fuel has been shooting up consistently in the last few months. This adversely has affected the purse of the common man.

“This price hike should be a good enough reason to minimise the use of motor vehicles that run on petrol or diesel. All citizens should come forward to arrest the mindless exploitation of natural resources,” said Arpita. A quiz competition was also held for the parents of the participants.

Organisers present at the competition said similar awareness programmes would be held all over the state during the fortnight. “Competitions in painting, debate, slogan writing, cycle rallies, training programmes for drivers and housewives and pollution checking camps have been planned. The state energy department has joined hands with the oil companies in our campaign,” said Ashish Tripathy, deputy manager (technical services) of IndianOil Corporation.

On this occasion, the chief guest was commissioner-cum-secretary of the state energy department, Pradeep Kumar Jena. He said energy conservation had become the prime focus of the state government. “Sustainable development has assumed greater significance today than ever before. Only aware citizens can take care of emerging issues.

“Therefore, the government is taking all necessary measures to reach out to the citizens, particularly school children,” said Jena.

He added the state government was in the process of preparing chapters that were to be included in school textbooks from Class IV onwards. “The children should be made aware at the foundation level so that they can share it with their peers and family members.

“Apart from this fortnightly campaign, we are also planning to organise activities around the year,” he added.

State officials of food and civil supplies, energy department and IndianOil Corporation inaugurated OGCF yesterday.