Next transformative idea: 80 million connections under Ujjwala in 100 days

By Subhash Narayan

New Delhi, July 16 (IANS) The Modi 2.0 next big goal is to take its flagship Ujjwala scheme to 80 million households in first 100 days of the government.

The scheme, which provides free cooking gas connection to female members of below poverty line families, has been hugely successful ever since its launch on May 1, 2016 and has also aided the ruling formation in the just concluded general election.

So far, Ujjwala connections have reached about 72 million mark. And, government officials said that taking it to 80 million mark would be worked upon on war footing so that the original target of Ujjwala is reached in next 100 days.

In addition, another 10-20 million new LPG connections would be given in subsequent months to cover "all poor households" as part of Cabinet decision taken late last year. With this, the access to cooking gas, or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), to 100 per cent of the country's households would be completed before the year end. At present about 93-94 per cent of households gave access to cooking gas.

The Modi government has identified 167 transformative ideas across various areas which have to be implemented in a time-bound manner. These ideas, if implemented, would bring visible change and make meaningful difference in the life of ordinary citizens.

With this, the mission of providing clean fuel to all households in the country would be completed and the next phase would begin where focus would be to ensure that all new connections, particularly by the poorer sections of the society, take a LPG refill.

Under Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) gas connection is provided to below poverty line families with a support of Rs 1,600 for each connection. The LPG connection is provided in the name of the female member of the family.

Launched in May 2016, the PMUY was initially aimed at providing clean cooking fuel to 50 million women from poor households classified as eligible over a period of three years. A sum of Rs 8,000 crore was allocated for the scheme to start with. However, given the success of the scheme, the then finance minister Arun Jaitley announced in the 2018-19 Budget to allocate an additional Rs 4,800 crore and increased the target to 80 million households.

In December, the Union Cabinet also decided to cover all poor households under the scheme that would further increase the number of new connections by 1-2 crore.

The government is also toying with the idea of promoting the use of smaller 5 kg LPG gas cylinders under PMUY so that refill rate increases. For this is separate subsidy plan has already been worked out under the existing direct benefit transfer (DBT) scheme.

The average LPG cylinder refill under Ujjwala is a pathetic 3 per annum while the national average stands close to seven refills in a year. Ministry of petroleum has studied that high cost of refills for a 14.2 kg cylinder is one of the main reasons why lower number of LPG cylinders were being used by BPL families. With 5 kg cylinders, refills can be had at one-third the price of a regular cylinder. This will make it easier for families to increase year round use of gas connections given under Ujjwala.

(Subhash Narayan can be contacted at subhash.n@ians.in)