When the Strait of Hormuz comes under threat, India’s kitchen is one of the first things that feels it.
That is not an exaggeration. India consumes roughly 31.3 million metric tonnes of LPG a year and imports between 60 and 67 per cent of what it needs, depending on which source you consult. Over 90 per cent of those imports transit through the Strait.
When the current Iran-US-Israel conflict disrupted shipping through that chokepoint, the effects were almost immediate: weekly LPG imports fell by an estimated 30 per cent, commercial cylinder supply was halted in cities across the country, and the government invoked the Essential Commodities Act to prioritise household supply.
The…