Auto makers flag chloride and moisture worries in India's E20 fuel as SIAM retracts complaint

Senior staff at Maruti Suzuki, Tata Motors and Mahindra discussed in internal emails that chloride concentrations and water content in E20 petrol were exceeding government limits, potentially harming engines. Their companies participated in a large-scale testing program that collected more than 250 fuel samples from retail outlets in up to 21 Indian states, detecting elevated chloride in 18 states and moisture spikes in several regions.

Although the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) had lodged a complaint about fuel contamination, it withdrew the July 28 letter, saying some numbers required further authentication. The withdrawal was described as inadvertent and based on insufficient sample size. Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri noted that state-run oil marketers had conducted rigorous testing two weeks before SIAM’s letter, finding only four contamination instances. State-owned retailers also reported no cause for alarm, while Mahindra dismissed the email revelations as baseless.