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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

Commercial LPG 'evaporates' in Maharashtra

Mumbai : The short supply of commercial LPG cylinders turned ‘grim’ on Wednesday as hundreds of small and medium eateries – on whom the ordinary working Mumbaikars depend on for daily meals – shut down or drastically trimmed menus, on Wednesday.   With an estimated 50,000-plus hotels, restaurants and small food joints, the crunch is beginning to be felt severely, said Federation of Hotel and Restaurant Association of India (FHRAI) vice-president and Hotel and Restaurant Association Western...

Commercial LPG 'evaporates' in Maharashtra

Mumbai : The short supply of commercial LPG cylinders turned ‘grim’ on Wednesday as hundreds of small and medium eateries – on whom the ordinary working Mumbaikars depend on for daily meals – shut down or drastically trimmed menus, on Wednesday.   With an estimated 50,000-plus hotels, restaurants and small food joints, the crunch is beginning to be felt severely, said Federation of Hotel and Restaurant Association of India (FHRAI) vice-president and Hotel and Restaurant Association Western India (HRAWI) spokesperson Pradeep Shetty.   “We are in continuous touch with the concerned authorities, but the situation is very gloomy. There is no response from the Centre or the Ministry of Petroleum on when the situation will ease. We fear that more than 50 pc of all eateries in Mumbai will soon down the shutters. The same will apply to the rest of the state and many other parts of India,” Shetty told  ‘ The Perfect Voice’ .   The shortage of commercial LPG has badly affected multiple sectors, including the hospitality and food industries, mass private or commercial kitchens and even the laundry businesses, industry players said.   At their wits' ends, many restaurateurs resorted to the reliable old iron ‘chulhas’ (stoves) fired by either coal or wood - the prices of which have also shot up and result in pollution - besides delaying the cooking.   Anticipating a larger crisis, even domestic LPG consumers besieged retail dealers in Mumbai, Pune, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Ratnagiri, Kolhapur, Akola, Nagpur to book their second cylinder, with snaky queues in many cities. The stark reality of the 12-days old Gulf war with the disturbed supplies has hit the people and industries in the food supply chains that feed crores daily.   “The ordinary folks leave home in the morning after breakfast, then they rely on the others in the food chain for their lunch or dinner. Many street retailers have also shut down temporarily,” said Shetty.   Dry Snacks A quick survey of some suburban ‘khau gullies’ today revealed that the available items were mostly cold sandwiches, fruit or vegetable salads, cold desserts or ice-creams, cold beverages and packed snacks. Few offered the regular ‘piping hot’ foods that need elaborate cooking, or charging higher than normal menu rates, and even the app-based food delivery system was impacted.   Many people were seen gloomily munching on colorful packets of dry snacks like chips, chivda, sev, gathiya, samosas, etc. for lunch, the usually cheerful ‘chai ki dukaans’ suddenly disappeared from their corners, though soft drinks and tetrapaks were available.   Delay, Scarcity  Maharashtra LPG Dealers Association President Deepak Singh yesterday conceded to “some delays due to supply shortages” of commercial cylinders, but assured that there is no scarcity of domestic cylinders.   “We are adhering to the Centre’s guidelines for a 25 days booking period between 2 cylinders (domestic). The issue is with commercial cylinders but even those are available though less in numbers,” said Singh, adding that guidelines to prioritise educational institutions, hospitals, and defence, are being followed, but others are also getting their supplies.   Despite the assurances, Shetty said that the current status is extremely serious since the past week and the intermittent disruptions have escalated into a near-total halt in supplies in many regions since Monday.   Adding to the dismal picture is the likelihood of local hoteliers associations in different cities like Pune, Palghar, Nagpur, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, and more resorting to tough measures from Thursday, including temporary shutdown of their outlets, which have run out of gas stocks.

Ajit Pawar backs Hindi in schools, criticizes opponents

Mumbai: As the issue of making Hindi as a compulsory language in the schools across Maharashtra is taking ugly turn, the deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar has swung into action and lambasted the opposition parties including the MNS.


The Devendra Fadnavis-led state government’s move to introduce Hindi as a compulsory language in Classes 1 to 5 in Marathi and English schools has not gone down well as opposition leaders targeted the government. The MNS chief Raj Thackeray has warned the government, saying that “the party will not allow the Centre’s current efforts to ‘Hindi-fy’ everything to succeed in Maharashtra". He also announced that the MNS will not tolerate this compulsion while appealing to the state government to immediately withdraw this decision.


Against this backdrop on Friday Ajit Pawar entered the arena in support of making Hindi compulsory. He said, “those opposing the decision are raking up unnecessary disputes for lack of real issues. Marathi is our mother tongue and will always have first preference in the state. Some people are creating disputes over the Hindi language only because they have nothing else to do. English is widely used across the country, and similarly, Hindi is spoken in many states. While there is a dispute over whether Hindi is the Rashtra Bhasha', I don't want to get into that”.


Pawar asserted that all three languages Marathi, Hindi and English are important, but Marathi will always hold primacy in the state. Marathi must remain intact and continue to grow.


Highlighting the Centre's role in promoting the language, Pawar said, “It was Prime Minister Narendra Modi who granted Marathi the status of a classical language, a decision that had been pending in Delhi for years. The NDA government showed the courage to make it happen”.


He added that plans are underway to set up a Marathi Bhasha Bhavan in Mumbai to further promote the language.


The three-language formula for classes 1 to 5 is a part of the new curriculum implementation under the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. The state school education department has declared a phase-wise implementation plan of the new curriculum framework designed as per the NEP 2020 recommendations for school education.

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