Bhopal, Mar 23 (PTI The Madhya Pradesh government on Monday allocated 9 per cent commercial gas to hotels and restaurants and 7 per cent to dhabas and street food vendors amid the West Asia crisis, officials said.
The relief came after the Indore-Bhopal chapter of the National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI) met Additional Chief Secretary of the Food and Civil Supplies Department Rashmi Arun Shami a day earlier, they added.
During the meeting, the delegation led by NRAI MP president Abhishek Baheti, urged immediate availability of commercial gas, citing the restaurant and hospitality sector's dependence on it, Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) MP president Dharmendra Sharma told PTI.
The delegation included NRAI representatives Sapan Arora, Amit Baheti, Deepesh Motwani, Shrikant Singh, Sachin Agrawal, Garvit Agrawal, Sagar Gaire, Vishnu Sharma and Kush Manohar, he said.
Last week, the CAIT urged the state government to immediately restore at least a limited supply of commercial LPG cylinders to prevent the complete shutdown of the hospitality and food services. It had asked the government to adopt a pragmatic approach because zero supply of LPG had crippled the sector.
Meanwhile, many hotels, restaurants and roadside eateries in MP have switched to induction stoves or coal-fired hearths to keep operating.
Two days ago, the Centre approved an additional 20 per cent allocation of commercial LPG to states and Union Territories, taking the total allocation to 50 per cent, as increased domestic output is helping the situation crawl back to normalcy.
The war in the Middle East disrupted energy supplies to India, leading to initial curtailment in LPG supplies to commercial establishments like hotels to prioritize supplies to household kitchens.
Later, a fifth of their supplies were restored, and the government offered an additional 10 per cent, subject to states expediting piped gas projects.