The government cut subsidized gas cylinders for poor households from nine to four, citing rising costs and efforts to control fuel subsidies.
The government has reduced the number of subsidised cooking gas cylinders that 105 million poor households get under a popular welfare scheme from nine to four, a top petroleum ministry officer said Monday, a day after the reduction was communicated almost as an aside in a statement justifying the ₹29 increase in the price of a 14.2 kg cyclinder that was announced on Sunday.
Praveen M Khanooja, an additional secretary in the petroleum ministry justified this by pointing to the fact that state-run oil companies are still losing ₹700 on every 14.2 kg LPG refill, ₹6 per litre on petrol, and ₹30 a litre on diesel.
He added that all cooking gas customers (about 333.7 million) are still getting LPG refills cheaper by ₹700 per cylinder compared to market rates. In addition the beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) , around 105 million poor households, get a ₹300 per cylinder subsidy up to four refills in a year.
His clarification came a day after a petroleum ministry statement on the price hike said: “A PMUY beneficiary will additionally receive the direct benefit transfer of ₹300 a cylinder on the first four refills each year — broadly the average consumption of a typical Ujjwala household…”
That was the first sign that the government had officially reduced the number of subsidised cylinders from nine to four. In August 2025, the Union Cabinet had approved the subsidy for nine cylinders a year.
PMUY was first launched in Ballia, Uttar Pradesh in 2016 as a scheme to give free connection to clean fuel (LPG) with no installation charges for deprived households. From August 2021 (Ujjwala 2.0), each connection also included the first free LPG cylinder and a stove. Some states gave add-on free cylinders along with the centre’s scheme.
During the Covid-19 pandemic (under under the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana), the government provided three cylinders to Ujjwala beneficiaries for free. From May 2022, the government started giving a targeted subsidy of ₹200 per 14.2 kg cylinder for PMUY beneficiaries for up to 12 refills a year for years 2022-23 and 2023-24. In October 2023 the targeted LPG subsidy was raised to ₹300 for up to 12 refills per annum.
On August 8, 2025, the Cabinet approved the targeted subsidy of ₹300 per 14.2 kg cylinder for up to nine refills per year to Ujjwala beneficiaries for 2025-26. Now, the number has been reduced to four with a subsidy cap of ₹300 per 14.2 kg cylinder.
The government’s efforts saw a jump in consumption of domestic LPG. As per a statement issued by the Union cabinet on August 8, 2025, average per capita consumption of PMUY consumers, which was only about three refills in 2019-20 and 3. 68 refills in 2022-23, improved to about 4.47 in 2024-25.
Experts said the reduction in number of subsidized cylinders from nine to four is to check the ballooning fuel subsidy bill despite two rounds of price hikes. Global energy markets have been roiled by the war in West Asia. Khanooja did not give an estimate of LPG subsidy outgo in 2026-27 under a volatile international energy scenario.
According to the petroleum ministry’s June 7 statement, over 333.7 million consumers get two types of price protection, one of the under-recoveries incurred by the OMCs for all consumers and the other is an additional ₹300 per cylinder subsidy to 105.8 million Ujjwala beneficiaries.
“The under-recovery is the gap between the international cost of the molecule and the regulated retail price; it is absorbed by the public sector marketing companies and compensated in part by the exchequer,” the ministry said in a statement.
