In a shocking diversion of cooking gas cylinders meant for BPL families under the flagship Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY), data from a CAG audit report showed that about 2.61 lakh BPL consumers bought two subsidised LPG refills each in a single day in about three lakh instances from two state-owned oil companies.
In some cases, over 1,300 consumers purchased 12 cylinders each in a day between May 2016, when the scheme was launched, and December 2018. Nearly 7,000 bought four cylinders a day; 4,000 BPL beneficiaries were issued five refills a day.
Two public sector oil companies — IOCL and HPCL — which lacked effective mechanism to restrict booking or delivery of more than one refill a day, together issued 2 to 20 refills to 2.98 lakh beneficiaries during 2016-2018.
