In a relief to households that are reeling from high inflation including record cooking gas prices, the government has announced to provide LPG subsidy to the poor on 12 cylinders in a year. The announcement was accompanied by another decision to cut taxes on petrol and diesel prices. Here’re details about who will get LPG subsidy and how much:
The LPG Subsidy Announcement: The Latest Price Of A Cylinder
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in a tweet on Saturday said, “We will give a subsidy of Rs 200 per gas cylinder (up to 12 cylinders) to over nine crore beneficiaries of Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana. This will help our mothers and sisters. This will have a revenue implication of around Rs 6,100 crore a year.”
Currently, all users including Ujjwala Yojana beneficiaries buy LPG cylinders at a market rate after the subsidy was discontinued in June 2020. A 14.2-kg LPG cylinder costs Rs 1,003 in the national capital. Now, after the latest government decision, for Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana beneficiaries, a subsidy of Rs 200 per cylinder will be directly credited to their bank accounts and the effective price for them would be Rs 803 per 14.2-kg cylinder.
What is Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY)? Eligibility, Benefits
The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas in May 2016 introduced the PMUY as a flagship scheme with an objective to make clean cooking fuels, such as LPG, available to the rural and deprived households which were otherwise using traditional cooking fuels such as firewood, coal and cow-dung cakes. Usage of traditional cooking fuels had detrimental impacts on the health of rural women as well as on the environment.
As on April 25, about 9.17 crore LPG connections had been released under the scheme, according to the PMUY’s website.
Those eligible to get an LPG connection under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana include adult woman belonging to SC households, ST households, Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Gramin), most-backward classes, Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY), tea and ex-tea garden tribes, forest dwellers, people residing in islands and river islands, SECC households (AHL TIN), poor household as per 14-point declaration. The applicant must have attained 18 years of age. There should not be any other LPG connections in the same household.
Cash assistance for PMUY connections is provided by Government of India. All PMUY beneficiaries will be provided with first LPG refill and Stove (hotplate) both free of cost along with their deposit free connection by the oil marketing companies (OMCs).
The Inflation Scenario
Prices of various items in India have been on the rising, thus pushing the retail inflation to 8-year high levels. The Consumer Price Index (CPI)-based inflation, which the RBI takes as a reference point while deciding on the monetary policy, in April 2022 soared to an eight-year high of 7.79 per cent. It is as compared with 4.23 per cent in April 2021 and 6.97 per cent in March 2022. Inflation in the food basket rose to 8.38 per cent in April, from 7.68 per cent in the preceding month and 1.96 per cent in the year-ago month.
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