With India importing most of its fuel needs, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday urged citizens to work from home, cut petrol and diesel use, limit foreign travel and defer non-essential gold purchases for about a year. Modi made the appeal while inaugurating and laying foundation stones for projects worth about Rs 9,400 crore during a visit to Telangana. He framed the measures as matters of economic and national interest, asking people to revive pandemic-era practices such as virtual meetings and remote working to conserve fuel and foreign exchange. The request is aimed at easing pressure on supplies and the rupee as the conflict involving Iran disrupts shipments through the Strait of Hormuz.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi told Indians to change household and workplace behaviour to help the country weather energy shocks, according to reports. He urged people to use metros and public transport where available, carpool when possible, prefer rail for goods movement, adopt electric vehicles and shift routine meetings online to reduce petrol and diesel consumption. Modi also asked citizens to postpone foreign trips and limit overseas weddings and vacations for about a year, and to avoid non-essential gold purchases during the period of heightened global uncertainty. The appeal was made during his visit to Telangana where he inaugurated and laid foundation stones for projects valued at around Rs 9,400 crore, the reports said.
Modi frames the appeal as national duty
Modi described the measures as both economic and an act of national interest, telling citizens that India doesn't hold large domestic oil reserves and that the government had absorbed much of the initial impact of higher energy prices. He said it was now necessary for households and businesses to show restraint in consumption, according to accounts of the event. The prime minister explicitly asked people to revive the remote-working and virtual meeting habits that became widespread during the pandemic, presenting those practices as a way to conserve fuel and foreign exchange.
Reports give slightly different locations for the remarks; two accounts say Modi spoke in Hyderabad while another places the event in nearby Secunderabad within the same metropolitan area. The accounts agree on the appeal’s specifics and its stated purpose of reducing imports and safeguarding the economy.
Why the request: disrupted supplies and import pain
The economic logic behind the appeal is straightforward, according to the reporting. The war involving Iran has disrupted shipments through the Strait of Hormuz and pushed energy prices higher, widening India’s import bill and threatening a larger trade and current account deficit. India imports nearly 85% of its fuel needs, and the country relies on the Strait of Hormuz for about 50% of its crude oil imports, roughly 60% of its liquefied natural gas and nearly all of its LPG. That exposure leaves the economy vulnerable to supply shocks and exchange-rate pressure.
Market moves have reflected the strain. Trading on Monday hit near-record lows for the rupee, according to one report, and shares in consumer-linked sectors reacted swiftly. Jewellery firms were reported to have fallen as much as 10% in early trade, the Tata group jeweller Titan was said to have dropped about 6%, and carrier IndiGo slipped roughly 2.8% in early trading.
One report quoted the International Energy Agency as calling the disruption the "largest supply disruption in history", a statement that appeared in a single account.
Officials have been absorbing some of the initial shock by shouldering costs, the prime minister said in the reports, but he warned that this was not sustainable without public participation in cutting consumption. The measures he proposed are practical. Using public transport and moving more meetings online are actions that can be adopted quickly and are low-cost for many households and firms, the reports noted.
Business reaction, as reported, was mixed in emphasis though not uniformly sceptical. One outlet quoted corporate leaders and human resources executives saying that remote and hybrid arrangements can sustain productivity and wellbeing if workplaces plan for them, and that trust-based flexible policies help engagement.
Some founders described renewed remote work as an opportunity to build a more resilient workforce. That business-friendly interpretation came from a single account; other reports focused more on macroeconomic metrics and market responses than on workplace readiness.
The reporting also included a single-sourced mention of a quotation attributed to President Donald Trump describing an Iranian counterproposal as "TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE". That remark was noted in one account and hasn't been widely repeated across the other reports in the set.
For now, Modi’s appeal is both behavioural and temporal. It asks for an immediate tightening of routine consumption and for lifestyle adjustments lasting about a year while the conflict continues to influence global energy flows.
Related Articles
- US disables two Iranian tankers as truce hangs in balance
- Ships shift offshore as Iran widens control of Hormuz
- China orders firms to defy 5 US sanctions
He asked citizens to curb foreign travel and defer non-essential gold purchases for about a year, as a temporary measure to ease pressure on supplies and support the rupee.
This article was created with AI assistance.
