India's national oil refineries will stop using Methylcyclopentadienyl Manganese Tricarbonyl (MMT), a manganese-based octane enhancer in petrol, that affects the brain and fouls up emission control components in vehicles.

The Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) said in a statement here Thursday the petroleum ministry had written to it that public sector oil refineries would not use MMT anymore.

Numaligarh Refinery Ltd, the only other refinery that uses MMT as a trimming agent for a marginal increase in the octane number of motor spirit, will stop doing so from March next year, the CSE statement said.

The CSE had issued a public alert in March over the use of MMT in petrol by oil companies in India. The lethal neurotoxin manganese particles from MMT blended petrol are a health hazard, the NGO had said.