Tea, Coffee, Puri and Dosa remove from menu, LPG crisis hit Hyderabad IT hostels

Hyderabad: For thousands of IT professionals who call Hyderabad’s bustling IT corridor `home', the daily routine, a quick cup of tea before the morning commute, a hot breakfast of steaming idli or a crispy dosa, has suddenly vanished. Instead, they are waking up to a chilling notice in their dining halls: the gas is running out.

For the nearly 10 to 11 lakh IT employees and students currently residing in the city’s hostels, this isn’t just an inconvenience; it is a full-blown food emergency. With commercial cooking gas cylinders becoming a rare commodity, hostel kitchens have come to a grinding halt.

Hostels using firewood stoves

"The gas is almost exhausted," says Vellampalli Maheedhar, Treasurer from the IT Corridor Hostel Association, speaking to the NewsMeter. "We are now resorting to using firewood stoves just to manage the bare minimum. We are looking for alternatives, but the scale of this is immense; we simply cannot prepare industrial-sized meals for thousands of people with current equipment limitations."

The crisis, which the association links to the ripple effects of the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East.

No Tea or Dosa

Tea and coffee have been pulled from menus. Even chapathi, dosa, and puri, which are time-consuming and fuel-intensive to prepare, have been taken down from the menu. In their place, hostels are reverting to basic, simplified meals like rice and sambar. Even the simple comfort of self-cooking facilities has been stripped away to conserve the remaining fuel.

Hostels might shut down

"We are doing everything we can to avoid passing the burden onto the residents," Mahidhar emphasizes, noting that hostel fees remain unchanged despite the soaring costs of the available gas. The price of a commercial cylinder has spiked from approximately ₹1,950 to over ₹2,300 in a matter of weeks, adding immense financial pressure on hostel owners already struggling to keep their doors open.

The association warns that if the situation does not improve, the impact will ripple far beyond the kitchen. With approximately 1,100 hostels housing a massive chunk of the city’s workforce, a systemic shutdown of these facilities is not an impossible outcome.

“Government intervention is needed”

"Our request is simple: if the government can ensure a consistent supply of gas to hostels, these employees can continue their work," Mahidhar says, pointing to the risk of further disruption, including a fuel and transport crisis that could eventually force thousands to abandon their jobs and return to their hometowns.