Sixty-year-old Rajendran Sivalingam, a retired government employee and his wife, Maheswari Rajendran, never imagined that a conflict elsewhere in the world would make their plans go upside down. Rajendran, who is turning 60 on March 24, had organised his 60th birthday celebration in a grand manner at a marriage hall in Mylapore in Chennai. On Tuesday, the wedding caterer called him to say that they are short of LPG cylinders and that there will be no food available. While he persuaded, the caterer said that he could cook only if Rajendran could organise the LPG cylinders. And after several phone calls and negotiations, the caterer had now agreed to come up with a ‘no oil, no boil menu.’
Hotels in Chennai, Madurai, Coimbatore and other tier two cities in Tamil Nadu have warned of a possible shut down due to unavailability of commercial LPG cylinders. As of now, the commercial cylinder supply is likely to stop anytime due to the disruption in LPG supply.
According to the Chennai Hotel Owners Association, there are no alternatives but to shut down the hotels if there is a disruption in the supply of LPG cylinders. There are more than 10,000 hotels, small eateries, tea shops and establishments across Chennai, which consume at least five commercial cylinders per outlet every day. “We do not have any other option but to shut down. We cannot afford to run the eateries without the supply of LPG cylinders, “ said M. Ravi, president of the Chennai hotel owners association.
The food supply will be affected massively. While some of the outlets have chosen to go for induction-based cooking and electric stoves, Ravi says these alternatives are only a temporary relief. “This is an unprecedented situation. I hope the union government will resolve this quickly. We have already written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to intervene and ensure an uninterrupted supply of cooking gas,” says Ravi.
“We are preparing only short eats like salads, which do not require cooking gas. I have shut the morning tea and snacks counter,” says Rajesh Pandiarajan, who runs a tea shop at Ashok Nagar, which is a prominent walking area in Chennai. Like Rajesh, most hotels either opened late on Wednesday, cut down on their menus and served only essential items that run round the clock and do not require reheating. Popular hotels in Chennai like Adyar Ananda Bhavan and Sangeetha, displayed boards outside the restaurants saying they have LPG only for the next two weeks, along with a temporary change oin the menu. One of the hotel owners even said the situation resembled the COVID lockdown when they suffered huge financial losses.
The Tamil Nadu Hotels Association had also urged the Centre to withdraw the existing restrictions on commercial LPG cylinder supply. “The hospitality sector employs a large workforce, and disruptions could affect both businesses and consumers,” the association wrote in its letter to the central government.
With hotels winding back on their operations, the gig economy is likely to face a huge disruption, with many of the Swiggy and Zomato drivers going jobless. “I have only one pick-up order today. The restaurant changed the time. I used to get at least 10 orders every day at lunch. It is already 2 pm, and I have got only one order,” says Sathish Ramkumar, a 21-year-old who works for one of the food delivery apps.
Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, meanwhile, convened an emergency meeting with the representatives of the traders associations, hotel owners and also the bureaucracy to take stock of the situation. Sources said that while commercial LPG supply may be disrupted as of now, the state has a stock of the domestic LPG supply for the next 20 days.