Kerala CM blames successive Congress, BJP governments at Centre for India’s cooking gas crisis

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Saturday (March 21, 2026) pushed the cooking gas scarcity roiling the national economy into Kerala’s electoral debate by blaming successive Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) governments at the Centre for the “unprecedented energy crisis”.

In a statement in Thiruvananthapuram, Mr Vijayan said that the Congress in 2006, and later the BJP, “capitulated to American imperialism’ by repeatedly rejecting the proposed India-Iran gas pipeline.

Mr Vijayan termed the decision “a historical mistake” that has cost the country dear. He said the Congress government at the Centre ousted and later politically sidelined the then Petroleum Minister, Mani Shankar Aiyar, for strongly backing the pipeline, which would have guaranteed India’s energy security.

Mr Vijayan said corporate interests had also played a role in India’s “shortsighted” decision to shelve the pipeline project. He said the Congress replaced Mr Iyer with Murli Deora, known for his allegedly pro-corporate approach to India’s energy policy, to help the private sector profit. “Instead of promulgating a pro-people energy security policy, the Congress adopted a corporate-centric petroleum policy which ultimately benefited the private sector at the cost of India’s long-term energy reliability”, he said.

Mr Vijayan accused the BJP of turning a blind eye to the economic fallout of the cooking gas crisis, including the shutdown, large-scale layoffs, and the loss of livelihoods in the hotel industry.

He said the Congress and the BJP had “bypassed” public oil companies and allowed two private oil refineries to form monopolies. Mr Vijayan said the BJP government at the Centre had stopped buying oil from Russia “in deference to America’s diktats.”

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Mr Vijayan said the oil shock caused by the war in West Asia threatened the country’s economy. “The Centre failed to foresee threats to India’s energy security. The Centre has myopically failed to increase LNG production or ensure sufficient stock of crude to tide over the crisis”, he said.

Mr Vijayan said the oil shock has sent inflation on an upward spiral and threatened to exacerbate the cost-of-living crisis. “However, the BJP has no answer as to how the dire situation came to pass,” he said.