A decade on, 'Give It Up' campaign loses steam after a promising start

It has been a decade since the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government launched the PAHAL (Pratyaksh Hastantarit Labh) Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) scheme, or Pahal-DBT, across the country. Initially introduced in 2013 in 54 districts, the scheme was expanded nationwide in January 2015.

 

On March 27, 2015, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the ‘Give It Up’ campaign at the ‘Urja Sangam’ global energy summit, urging economically well-off individuals to voluntarily surrender their LPG subsidy to help the government provide the connections to poor households. A year later, on May 1, 2016, the Centre introduced the PM Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) to offer deposit-free LPG connections to adult women from economically disadvantaged households.

 

Within a year of the Prime Minister’s appeal, nearly 10 million people had surrendered their LPG subsidy. However, progress slowed in the following years. According to the PMUY website, 11.5 million people have given up their LPG subsidy to date.

 

The initial target of distributing 80 million LPG connections under PMUY was achieved in September 2019. To extend coverage further, Ujjwala 2.0 was launched in August 2021 targeting an additional 16 million connections, which was achieved by December 2022. The government later approved the release of 7.5 million more connections for the period 2023-24 to 2025-26, a target that was reached in July 2024, Minister of State of Petroleum and Natural Gas Suresh Gopi told the Lok Sabha last week. As of January 1, 2025, there were 103.3 million PMUY connections across the country.

 

In December 2024, the Standing Committee on Petroleum said the current annual LPG cylinder refill rate under PMUY stands at 3.95 per year, much lower than the 6.5 per year for non-PMUY households. The committee noted that the Rs 300 refill subsidy has led to an increase in the refill rate from 3.01 per year in 2019-20 to 3.95 per year in 2023-24. However, this remains well below the government’s stated policy of providing 12 subsidised LPG cylinders per year. The committee identified a direct link between increased subsidies and higher refill rates, and recommended achieving universal LPG coverage for all Below Poverty Line (BPL) households, in alignment with PMUY objectives.

 

A 2016 report by the Petroleum Planning & Analysis Cell, based on a survey, highlighted key barriers preventing wider LPG adoption, such as high initial costs, including security deposits and gas stove prices (86 per cent of households), high recurring costs of refilling cylinders (83 per cent of households), and easy availability of firewood.