Bhatkal: A day after long queues were seen at petrol pumps in Bhatkal amid rumours of a possible fuel price rise linked to the escalating Middle East conflict, the coastal town is now witnessing a sharp spike in LPG bookings as residents rush to secure cooking gas refills.
Gas distributors in the Uttara Kannada town said bookings for domestic LPG cylinders have nearly doubled, with many consumers fearing potential supply disruptions if tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran worsen.
At the Bharat Gas agency in Mankuli, which normally receives around 270–280 bookings a day, the number crossed 700 on Thursday, agency sources said.
Similarly, Ranjan Indane Gas Agency near Sri Hanuman Temple in the Chennapatna area reported that bookings surged from the usual 200–250 per day to more than 400 in a single day.
Another distributor, Rafat Gas Agency in Nawayat Colony, also witnessed a sharp increase, with bookings exceeding 600 compared to its daily average of around 200–300.
Officials said the sudden surge appeared to have been triggered by a message widely circulating on social media claiming that restrictions would soon be imposed on LPG refills due to global war-like conditions.
According to the viral message, consumers with a single cylinder would be allowed to book a refill only after 21 days, while those with two cylinders could do so after 30 days. It also claimed that beneficiaries under the government’s Ujjwala free LPG scheme would be permitted to book refills only after 30 days.
The message further stated that refills would not be issued without OTP verification, bookings would be allowed only through registered mobile numbers, and that new LPG connections would be restricted to a single cylinder.
However, Bhatkal Tahsildar Nagendra Kolshetty dismissed the claims as baseless and said no such directives had been issued by the government.
“We have not received any such orders. The information circulating on social media is false,” Kolshetty said, urging the public not to believe or spread unverified messages.