At the start of every monsoon, Doli Kumari’s family refills their LPG cooking gas cylinder and uses it for three or four months. As the rai...
At the start of every monsoon, Doli Kumari’s family refills their LPG cooking gas cylinder and uses it for three or four months. As the rains recede in their village of Tarauna Bhojpur in Bihar’s Araria district, the family switches back to burning wood for daily cooking.
This monsoon, however, the family plans not to bother with refilling their cylinder.
“The gas prices were already as high as Rs 930 last month, when we had temporarily filled the cylinder for a wedding in the family,” said Doli Kumari, 22, a social worker. “Now they say the prices are even higher, so we will not be able to afford it.”
Doli Kumari’s reference is to the recent hike in cooking gas prices announced on March 1, when the cost of a 14.2 kg domestic LPG cylinder was raised by Rs 25. This is the seventh LPG price hike imposed by the central government since December 2020. Each cylinder now costs at least Rs 175 more than it did three months ago, with the price of LPG cylinders ranging between Rs 800 and Rs 1,000 in different parts of India.
Coming in the midst of a global pandemic that has derailed livelihoods and incomes across the country, these prices are a strain...
