Two India-flagged LPG carriers, Jag Vasant and Pine Gas, have transited through the Strait of Hormuz on Monday (March 23, 2026) evening. They are together carrying nearly 93,000 tonnes of LPG, as per the inter-Ministerial briefing held on Monday (March 23).
Jag Vasant and Pine Gas, owned by Great Eastern Shipping and Seven Island Shipping respectively, are likely to reach Indian ports between March 26 and 28.
In addition, a flurry of LPG import shipments that came in the past few days and scheduled for the upcoming week may have eased the cooking gas crisis somewhat. In a sign of this, the government had announced a 20% increase in commercial LPG allocations, taking it to 50% of pre-war levels even while saying the LPG situation continues to be worrisome.
The government had said that domestic LPG production had increased by 40%, which would mean an additional 18,000 tonnes production a day, bringing down the approximate daily import requirement from 55,000 tonnes. At normal times, India would need at least one Very Large Gas Carrier of some 55,000 tonne to dock at one of its ports every day and discharge the cargo.
Two foreign-owned and foreign-flagged LPG carriers, Hellas Gladiator and Gas Jupiter, each carrying 24,000 tonnes are expected to reach Vishakhapatnam on March 30.
Hellas Gladiator had loaded in Netherlands. Port sources say that this shipment is part of the strategic decision to source LPG from European markets to bypass the ongoing supply constraints in West Asia. The vessel is underway in the Indian Ocean. Gas Jupiter loaded its cargo in the U.S.
The cavern project of SA-LPG at Visakhapatnam, which is one of India’s two long-term LPG storage locations, had handled two ships carrying LPG after February 28. Each ship carried and unloaded about 24,000 tonnes. The total capacity of the cavern is 60,000 tonnes and is one of two long-term LPG storage facilities in India.
Globe Polaris, carrying cargo from Houston, Texas, is expected to reach Sandhead, Kolkata, on March 24, according to an official in Haldia port. It will berth the following day and discharge more than 20,000 tonnes in all.
BW Birch, carrying LPG taken from Nanda Devi in Vadinar Port in Gujarat through ship-to-ship transfer, is expected to dock at Haldia on March 29 and discharge cargo. Gas Jupiter is also expected on April 3 at Haldia. Recently, two LPG ships had discharged at Ennore, Chennai.
While Kochi has received no LPG since February 28 and none is expected this week either, two ships have discharged their LPG cargo at Ennore, Chennai, recently.
LPG carrier Apollo Ocean will call on New Mangalore Port (NMP) on March 25 to discharge nearly 27,000 tonne. The vessel, sailing under the Vietnam flag, is arriving from Vadinar where it took cargo from Shivalik.
Another LPG tanker carrying some 30,000 tonne of cargo is expected on March 29 at Mangaluru. The HPCL LPG import facility in Mangaluru transfers the imported LPG to local bottling plants as well as pumps the gas towards Bengaluru and beyond through the Mangaluru-Bengaluru LPG pipeline.
Meanwhile, a refinery expert who didn’t wish to be identified, cautioned that the 40% increase in domestic LPG production from refineries may not be sustainable in the long term. “Forty percent can be doable only if the extraction of all value-added products from the raw LPG is stopped and is pumped into the market as LPG. For instance, propylene production, which goes into manufacture of polypropylene, has been stopped and this will cause significant losses to the refinery,” the expert said.
(With inputs from Sumit Bhattacharje, Sunita Sekar, Anil Kumar Sastri, Satyasundar Barik, Dhinesh Kallungal, and Lalatendu Mishra)
Published – March 23, 2026 11:19 pm IST
