NEW DELHI: Cooking gas LPG price was hiked by a steep of Rs 144.5 per cylinder on Wednesday due to spurt in benchmark global rates of the fuel. According to the Indian Oil website, which supplies 30 lakh Indane cylinders daily all over India, a 14.2 kg non-subsidized LPG cylinder is now priced at ₹858.5 in New Delhi, a sharp hike of ₹144.5 from its last revision on 1st January.
Hike in January 2014
This is the steepest hike in rates since January 2014 when prices had gone up by Rs 220 per cylinder to Rs 1,241. Domestic LPG users, who are entitled to buy 12 bottles of 14.2-kg each at subsidized rates in a year, will get more subsidy. The government subsidy payout to domestic users has been increased from Rs 153.86 per cylinder to Rs 291.48, industry officials said. For Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) beneficiaries, the subsidy has increased from Rs 174.86 to Rs 312.48 per cylinder.
After accounting for the subsidy that is paid directly into the bank accounts of LPG users, a 14.2-kg cylinder would cost Rs 567.02 for domestic users and Rs 546.02 for PMUY users. The government gave out 8 crores free LPG connections to poor women under PMUY to increase coverage of environment-friendly fuel in kitchens.
Normally, LPG rates are revised on the 1st of every month but this time it took almost two weeks for the revision to take place – a phenomenon which industry officials said was due to approvals needed for such a big jump in subsidy outgo. Others said the decision to defer the increase could have been because of assembly elections in Delhi which were held on 8 February.