It is a widely known fact that many families in rural areas of India use fossil fuels to cook meals, which causes health-related issues, especially to a woman who does such activities. The BPL (Below Poverty Line) families face such a crisis due to the unavailability of LPG (Liquid Petroleum Gas) at their homes. In contrast, many in the urban and semi-urban belt have LPG services for cooking purposes.
Seeing the situation, experts believe that open fire in a kitchen harms as much as 400 cigarettes in an hour. The air pollution inside a particular room leads to respiratory disorders in children. It has outcomes like air pollution and deforestation.
Prime Minister Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) scheme was launched in 2016 by PM Modi under the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas to alleviate people’s suffering in rural areas. It focuses on its motives to offer healthy cooking fuel, promote women’s development and avoid any health-related concerns by not using fossil fuels.
In this, it aimed to provide 50 million LPG connections to women below the poverty line. It extended its target to eight crore women till March 2020. The scheme was implemented and attained its goals before seven months (completing the period) in September 2019.
The PMUY scheme carries financial back worth Rs 1600 to each family belonging to BPL who has an LPG connection in their house. It also provides an administrative cost of Rs 1600 to install the LPG connection and EMI facility for the stove and expenses included in refilling without any interest.
The scheme comes up with the Prime Minister’s ‘Give It Up Campaign’, through which a large number of middle-class families have themselves renounced the subsidy for cooking gas.
When it was first introduced, it included the following beneficiaries:
- List of people in the SECC 2011 list
- Most backward Classes (MBC)
- Forest Dwellers
- All SC/ST’s households beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY)(Gramin)
- Antoyoday Anna Yojana (AAY)
- People of islands and river islands
- Tea and Ex- Tea Garden Tribes
Eligibility and documents required for PMUY
- The applicant should have the BPL card and must be a resident of a rural area in India.
- The person applying for it must be a woman above the age of 18.
- To receive the subsidy, the applicant should have registered a savings bank account in one of the nationalised banks across the country.
- The applicant’s household should not carry an LPG connection before it.
- A BPL ration card
- Photo id which could be Aadhar card or voters id for identity proof
- Authorised BPL Certificate by the Panchayat Pradhan or Municipality Chairman of the area/region
- A latest passport size photograph of an applicant
Process of implementation of PMUY
A woman belonging to the BPL family without the LPG connection must apply to the LPG distributor for its service. After applying for it, the applicant must send details such as Address, Aadhar card number (If the applicant does not have an Aadhar card, then one should contact UIDAI to issue an Aadhar card) and Jandhan/Bank Account. The LPG fuel officials will verify the details sent with the SECC – 2011 database and confirm the BPL status of the family and fill the given details into a specific portal set up by the Oil Marketing Companies (OMC).
The deduplication process will be held by OMC with other steps for due diligence electronically. After accomplishing all these, the LPG connection will be provided by the OMC. The government reimburses the charges related to its connection. Although, the OMCs will provide EMI options to the applicant, and every month, the same will be taken from the subsidy.
