Pune: Maharashtra Natural Gas Limited officials on Wednesday said that despite being on track to make available piped natural gas to all households across the city, the company was facing difficulty in setting up its network in cantonment areas.Of the earlier identified three lakh households in the city, MNGL has so far managed to supply PNG to 1.2 lakh residences. "We are on track to reach most of the households in the Pune metropolitan area and we have sent around 100 proposals to Pune Municipal Corporation, the Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation and other authorities, but we are facing difficulty in reaching the areas that fall under cantonment boards, especially the Pune cantonment, which has a large number of households who could be potential users of PNG," said Santosh Sontakke, director of commerce, MNGL, while addressing a news conference in the city."The objections raised by military authorities are mainly regarding safety and security because of the number of military installations and the presence of army personnel," Sontakke said.He said though the PMC recently cancelled several digging permissions based on policy issues, they are confident of expanding the network to remaining parts of the city.Cantonment board sources said the ministry of defence and the Southern Command would take a final call on the supply of PNG in cantonment areas. The MoD has enacted a policy of having PNG facilities in the cantonment areas, with permissions depending on the class of land involved.Pune Cantonment Board chief executive officer D N Yadav said, "We have already cleared a proposal from MNGL regarding digging work for laying of pipelines. The decision now rests with military authorities".

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