liquefied Petroleum Gas (lPG) is now being used by 58.55 per cent of households in the State compared to 20 per cent in 2014 and the lPG penetration in Khordha district has already reached 100 per cent by May 1, 2018.
Union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan informed this at a lPG Panchayat held at Sunderpur, Mangaljodi under Tangi block in Khordha district on Saturday.
The programme, a part of the Gram Swaraj Abhiyan, was organised with an intention to promote the use of lPG among rural consumers and safe and sustained use of lPG through peer group interactions on a large scale.
He said the Central Government has set a target to provide gas connections to 80 lakh households by December-end 2018.
“As of now, a total of 24.23 lakh connections have been released under the Prime Minister Ujjwala Yojana. With 177 new lPG distributorships given last year, the number of lPG distributers in Odisha has increased to around 775 as on May 1 and plans are afoot to deploy more 225 more distributors to increase the number to 1,000. This shows the level of lPG penetration in the State,” Pradhan said.
Pradhan stated that four bottling plants are now operating in the State now and three new bottling plants are being planned to be set up in Khordha, Balangir and Rayagada districts.
Among others, MlA Bibhuti Bhusan Harichandan, Jitu Mitra, Prithviraj Harichandan, lalitendu Bidyadhar Mohapatra, Indian Oil CGM Pritish Bharat and IOCl lPG GM SK Jha were present.