Sri Lanka, March 1 -- Just over 60 years ago, multinational filling stations operated by Shell and Caltex were a common sight in our cities. This was the time when a wave of nationalization was sweeping even across staunchly capitalist countries such as the UK. Sri Lanka too got caught up in this sentiment with the then administration having a socialist bent.

The result was the expulsion of all the foreign filling station operators from Sri Lanka and the creation of the State-Owned Enterprise (SOE) the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC), which remained a monopoly until around 20 years ago, when the Indian Oil Company (IOC) was allowed to start operations. The CPC remained in the red until a couple of years ago, with a bloated workforce a...