New Delhi, April 7 -- India is planning a major push to increase the share of electric cooking stoves in its kitchens, as a shortage of cooking gas triggered by the West Asia war continues to hit households. The plan may involve bringing in multilateral financial institutions to arrange zero-interest loans through state-run Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL).

The EESL is likely to redesign and ramp up the three-year-old National Efficient Cooking Programme (NECP) to meet a surge in demand for what was largely a niche product before the conflict, two people aware of the matter said. Under the model under consideration, a third party would subsidize the interest on equated monthly instalments (EMIs), lowering the cost burden for economi...