Plugging in: Why India must electrify its kitchens at scale

India must electrify kitchens to reduce cooking costs, enhance efficiency, and ensure energy sovereignty while managing grid demands.

The story so far: India spends $26.4 billion a year importing cooking gas, most of it shipped through the Strait of Hormuz. It has 332 million LPG connections, yet 37% of households still burn firewood and dung. The arithmetic has shifted: cooking with electricity is now cheaper than cooking with unsubsidised LPG. But moving hundreds of millions of kitchens from flame to wire raises a chain of questions about cost, grid stress, and who pays when demand spikes.

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Domestic LPG connections grew from 150 million in 2015 to 332 million by 2025, but India imports 60% of its LPG and 50% of its natural gas. The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) estimates that the combined import bill hit $26.4 billion in FY24–25 — a 50% jump in six years.

Every West Asian escalation sends a price shock straight into Indian kitchens. Gas-based clean cooking has hit an affordability ceiling.

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An IEEFA study from October 2025 found that electric cooking is 37% cheaper than non-subsidised LPG and 14% cheaper than piped natural gas for a family of four in Delhi — without any electricity subsidy. Only the heavily subsidised Prime Minister Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) pricing undercuts e-cooking, and that subsidy costs the exchequer thousands of crores a year.