(TOI)
India is the world’s second largest importer of LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) after China and remains ahead of Japan as the Narendra Modi government’s drive to provide clean cooking fuel to millions of poor families boosted household demand by nearly 8% in 2017-18. The Prime Minister may flag the success of the Ujjwala scheme — one of his government’s flagship social programmes aimed at delivering “energy justice” to the poor — to emphasise the potential of India’s energy market and need for an equitable global oil pricing regime when he addresses policy-makers and oil industry bosses at the 16th International Energy Forum ministerial here on Wednesday. The IEF is a grouping of 72 countries accounting for 90% of global supply and demand for oil and gas. India beat Japan in 2016 to become the world’s third-largest consumer of crude oil after the US and China. Both International Energy Agency and Opec see India as the main driver of growth in global oil demand for the next decade.
