In response to the current LPG shortage catalysed by the war in West Asia, a differentiated refill rule has been introduced. Urban households can book a refill after 25 days, while rural households can do so after 45 days.The measure appears normal until one asks who adjusts, and whose burden is treated as acceptable.Rationing or supply management makes sense, and in a crisis situation, it becomes necessary. However, it is not self-evident why the terms of rationing should vary drastically across contexts. It appears to rest on the assumptions that rural households can fall back on traditional fuels such as firewood and dung cakes, and that urban households, as more intensive users of LPG, require quicker access to refills.AdvertisementContrary to the assumption, “rural” is not a uniform low-use category. Evidence from the India Residential Energy Survey (IRES) 2020 indicates that nearly 61 per cent of rural households use LPG as their primary fuel, while 28 per cent use it exclusively. According to the NSS 78th Round (2020–21), 49.4 per cent of rural households use LPG as their primary cooking fuel. While official “clean fuel” usage is slightly higher at 49.8 per cent, the data confirms that for rural India, clean energy is effectively synonymous with LPG cylinders.Also Read | Lives stalled over LPG: How a spike in demand led to long queues, shortagesMost importantly, NSS data also reveals that rural India is far from being a monolith in LPG usage. For example, while rural Telangana has already achieved high-level dependence, where 91.7 per cent of households use clean fuel as their primary source, usage in rural Chhattisgarh remains as low as 30.6 per cent. A “one-size-fits-all” 45-day rule for rural areas ignores this variation. With Ujjwala 2.0 and the general thrust of official policy, rural India has become more dependent on LPG since these studies were conducted.The usage-based justification of differentiation must also be seen in view of the scale of the burden imposed. Earlier, urban-rural refill gaps were marginal rather than a question of unequal fuel rights. The new 25/45 rule creates a 20-day urban-rural chasm. The burden of adjustment has therefore risen five times more sharply for rural households. This fivefold burden displays a hierarchy of rationing. Urban convenience is protected, while rural health and labour become buffers for scarcity. Further, longer delivery times in rural areas effectively amplify this gap.AdvertisementA comparison of alternatives reveals a fundamental difference in how urban and rural households cope. The former have multiple substitutes — induction cooking, piped gas, additional cylinders, or eating out — that allow routines to continue with limited disruption. Domestic PNG connections in India have surged from 72.47 lakh as of December 2020 to 1.62 crore by early 2026, with the expansion of this elite fuel largely concentrated in urban areas. Rural households, by contrast, have constrained choices. Piped gas is largely absent, and electricity is less reliable. Nearly three-fourths of rural households, the IRES study reveals, depend on a single cylinder, leaving no buffer in a 45-day lockout.Also Read | India’s energy security is tethered to a war zoneThe rural “fallback” is not equivalent to urban substitutes. Further, traditional fuels require long planning and impose significant labour costs in collecting, drying, and storing. They also often depend on shrinking common resources and cannot be mobilised instantly.The larger policy discourse, through programmes such as Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana, has long sought to move rural households away from traditional fuels due to health and environmental harms. These fuels have been presented as a “silent killer”, with household air pollution estimated to claim around 6,00,000 lives annually among Indian women. The inconsistency is that if these fuels are undesirable, those most likely to rely on them should have stronger claims to priority, not longer delays.Usage data, which may be cited to justify differentiation, is also misleading. While urban households consume more LPG on average, lower rural consumption reflects constrained access and affordability, not lesser need. It should be seen as the outcome of continuous self-rationing.The difference, therefore, is in the nature of dependence and not simply in levels of use. Due to relatively comparable substitutes, urban reliance on LPG is flexible. Rural reliance, though lower in volume, is rigid: Stretched, rationed, and costly to disrupt.Owing to joint families, which are more common in rural areas, pressure on a cylinder is increased, and per capita availability is reduced. Coping capacity also depends on purchasing power, where urban households generally have an edge, though not all are well-off. Further, if concerns about black marketing are more pronounced in urban areas, one might expect tighter restrictions there and not in rural areas.Also Read | ‘If this was our village, we’d have cooked on a chulha’: Despair and fatigue in long lines for gas in NoidaIt is primarily rural women who bear the consequences of this measure. On their part, the shift to traditional fuels entails additional time, effort, and exposure, along with the mobilisation of fuels that are not immediately ready. Their time and labour are perhaps considered a free resource with little value as compared to urban productivity. All this suggests a certain way of viewing. Cities tend to get quicker solutions; villages are expected to adjust.you may likeThe question is not just who has alternatives. It is about whose alternatives are treated as sufficient, whose adjustment is considered acceptable, and how the burden of scarcity is distributed. The 45-day rule appears to rest on a mistaken assumption that equates continued rural self-rationing with low consumption/demand and overlooks constraints of access. With this, wide variations in LPG dependence across rural India are also disregarded.Effectively, the measure shifts the burden of scarcity onto rural households, particularly women. This is creating a hierarchy of energy access, not neutral rationing where the convenience of the privileged is protected, but the most vulnerable bear the burden of scarcity. Such decisions are sustained, at least in part, through an urban-centric gaze where rural “adjustments” remain either invisible or are treated as natural.Praveen Dhanda teaches at Indraprastha College for Women, University of Delhi. The views expressed are personal