The Ministry for Petroleum & Natural Gas said that almost 81 per cent of the active domestic LPG consumers have joined the Direct Benefit Transfer of LPG scheme, known as PaHaL.
In a statement the Ministry said, as on March 2, 11.74 crore LPG consumers have joined the scheme, which was introduced in 54 districts on November 15, 2014 and in the rest of the country on January 1, 2015.
So far, ₹6,745.41 crore has been transferred since November 15, 2014 through 18.9 crore transactions.
From April 1, a period of three months, known as parking period, is being given to LPG consumers who have not yet joined DBTL.
“During parking period such consumers will get cylinders as per their entitlement at market price and subsidy will be kept parked with oil marketing companies. This parked subsidy would be released to the consumer as soon as he/she joins the scheme.
“However, if a consumer joins the scheme after the parking period, the parked subsidy would lapse and the consumer will get subsidy only from prospective date,” Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan said in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday.
The fixed permanent advance of ₹568 given to every consumer in the Direct Benefit Transfer of LPG scheme will be made variable every month and it will be equal to the actual subsidy at the time of booking a cylinder. However, the subsidy will be capped at ₹568.