For years, a tiny eatery in south Bengaluru had such a bustle of activity that it represented street theatre at its best. At breakfast, it served giant idlis for as little as ₹15, at lunch wholesome vegetable pulao with a vegetable and chutney on the side.

The clientele was a mix of white and blue collar, those without kitchens and those too busy or lazy to cook. Seating comprised plastic stools and a raised platform that served as a bench under a large tree.

A week or so after LPG prices shot up in the aftermath of the Israeli and US attack on Iran, however, this eatery closed. What the late urban historian Jane Jacobs described as the “ballet” of city life that occurred daily just outside the gates of the apartment complex I live in has vanished almost overnight.

Amid a call by the Prime Minister weeks ago for citizens to save foreign currency and fuel by reducing travel, opting for car-pools and so on, with companies urged to allow work-from-home, data released this week appears to confirm that India’s perennially K-shaped economy is responding in what might be called K-shaped fashion.

Small eateries everywhere are closing because the price and supply of LPG cylinders is under stress, while posh large restaurants report booming business.

Confusing price signals via muddled policy diktats are not helping. Data released on Tuesday showed that LPG consumption in May was down by 19%, while petrol usage is up by 3%.

And what is one to make of the reduction of aviation turbine fuel prices for international flights announced this week? Commercial LPG prices, notably, have been hiked four times since the war began while petrol price hikes have been relatively muted.

The petroleum ministry has underlined how it is softening the blow; the subsidy for a domestic LPG cylinder is ₹650.

What’s clear is that fuel conservation will effectively be imposed only by market discipline. In post-1991 India, we are too used to our comforts for sacrifice any other way. Evidence abounds. Instead of showing the effects of car-pooling, the traffic outside my gate resembles a river in flood. Just when I thought I might need to summon an Uber to cross the road, the Bengaluru police have responded at rush hour by manning this chaotic simulation of a demolition derby.

I claim to be doing my bit by cutting back on non-essential travel around the city, but the truth is that perpetual traffic jams have a cost-benefit logic of their own.

I am opting out of a confab on Friday and Saturday, for example, in the hope that it will go up on YouTube. I should take public transport, but the 9-minute walk to the local metro station is hard on both body and soul.

It involves alternately hurdling over construction debris and stepping onto the road where the pavement is left unusable by steep ramps built by homeowners to make parking their cars and scooters easier. In the last 200 metres before the station, the pretence of pedestrian amenities gives way to a colourful fruit and vegetable market.

The walk seems more like evading a rugby tackle than a ‘ballet’ of city life.

The upshot is that, after three decades of living overseas and always using public transport, I live in my adopted southern Indian hometown unwilling to use the metro network. But since I work from home anyway, I am way ahead of the national average of privileged Indians doing their bit to reduce fuel consumption—and traffic.

I was recently guilty of making a trip that forced me to reckon with how best to rationalize it, where I had to distinguish between essential and non-essential air travel.

Last month, I visited Delhi for a close college friend’s landmark birthday. That may or may not sound essential, but every journalist needs to occasionally be in the national capital.

One often meets brilliant civil servants in casual settings. On consecutive evenings, I learnt more about the compulsions of our erratic trade policy and ground-breaking reforms to widen pension access than I could working from home in Bengaluru. And, it’s a joy to motor along the wide avenues of Lutyens’ Delhi.

Yet, the ugly overhang of a K-shaped economy that has become starker since the pandemic looms everywhere. Private capex refuses to rise despite strong corporate balance sheets. Real household income growth remains in low single digits and has led to dips being made into savings.

This, after a long stretch of subdued oil prices. As Systematix Group points out in a recent analysis, “Crude prices remained benign for most of the past decade, which should have supported the economy and productivity… Even after the recent rebound, the average crude price in real rupee terms since 2014 is 30% lower over the preceding 12 years.”

Animal spirits need perking up; those with disposable income have a patriotic duty to spend. Accordingly, I binge shopped at a Dastkar handicrafts and handloom sale this week in Bengaluru. Those creating art in tie-and-dye shibori cloth counted among them Rajasthani women who had been trained more than a decade ago after years of breaking stones.

I came home feeling saintly instead of guilty. National service never seemed so pleasurable. Taking the metro would kill the vibe.

The author is a former Financial Times foreign correspondent.

For years, a tiny eatery in south Bengaluru had such a bustle of activity that it represented street theatre at its best. At breakfast, it served giant idlis for as little as ₹15, at lunch wholesome vegetable pulao with a vegetable and chutney on the side.

The clientele was a mix of white and blue collar, those without kitchens and those too busy or lazy to cook. Seating comprised plastic stools and a raised platform that served as a bench under a large tree.

A week or so after LPG prices shot up in the aftermath of the Israeli and US attack on Iran, however, this eatery closed. What the late urban historian Jane Jacobs described as the “ballet” of city life that occurred daily just outside the gates of the apartment complex I live in has vanished almost overnight.

Amid a call by the Prime Minister weeks ago for citizens to save foreign currency and fuel by reducing travel, opting for car-pools and so on, with companies urged to allow work-from-home, data released this week appears to confirm that India’s perennially K-shaped economy is responding in what might be called K-shaped fashion.

Small eateries everywhere are closing because the price and supply of LPG cylinders is under stress, while posh large restaurants report booming business.

Confusing price signals via muddled policy diktats are not helping. Data released on Tuesday showed that LPG consumption in May was down by 19%, while petrol usage is up by 3%.

And what is one to make of the reduction of aviation turbine fuel prices for international flights announced this week? Commercial LPG prices, notably, have been hiked four times since the war began while petrol price hikes have been relatively muted.

The petroleum ministry has underlined how it is softening the blow; the subsidy for a domestic LPG cylinder is ₹650.

What’s clear is that fuel conservation will effectively be imposed only by market discipline. In post-1991 India, we are too used to our comforts for sacrifice any other way. Evidence abounds. Instead of showing the effects of car-pooling, the traffic outside my gate resembles a river in flood. Just when I thought I might need to summon an Uber to cross the road, the Bengaluru police have responded at rush hour by manning this chaotic simulation of a demolition derby.

I claim to be doing my bit by cutting back on non-essential travel around the city, but the truth is that perpetual traffic jams have a cost-benefit logic of their own.

I am opting out of a confab on Friday and Saturday, for example, in the hope that it will go up on YouTube. I should take public transport, but the 9-minute walk to the local metro station is hard on both body and soul.

It involves alternately hurdling over construction debris and stepping onto the road where the pavement is left unusable by steep ramps built by homeowners to make parking their cars and scooters easier. In the last 200 metres before the station, the pretence of pedestrian amenities gives way to a colourful fruit and vegetable market.

The walk seems more like evading a rugby tackle than a ‘ballet’ of city life.

The upshot is that, after three decades of living overseas and always using public transport, I live in my adopted southern Indian hometown unwilling to use the metro network. But since I work from home anyway, I am way ahead of the national average of privileged Indians doing their bit to reduce fuel consumption—and traffic.

I was recently guilty of making a trip that forced me to reckon with how best to rationalize it, where I had to distinguish between essential and non-essential air travel.

Last month, I visited Delhi for a close college friend’s landmark birthday. That may or may not sound essential, but every journalist needs to occasionally be in the national capital.

One often meets brilliant civil servants in casual settings. On consecutive evenings, I learnt more about the compulsions of our erratic trade policy and ground-breaking reforms to widen pension access than I could working from home in Bengaluru. And, it’s a joy to motor along the wide avenues of Lutyens’ Delhi.

Yet, the ugly overhang of a K-shaped economy that has become starker since the pandemic looms everywhere. Private capex refuses to rise despite strong corporate balance sheets. Real household income growth remains in low single digits and has led to dips being made into savings.

This, after a long stretch of subdued oil prices. As Systematix Group points out in a recent analysis, “Crude prices remained benign for most of the past decade, which should have supported the economy and productivity… Even after the recent rebound, the average crude price in real rupee terms since 2014 is 30% lower over the preceding 12 years.”

Animal spirits need perking up; those with disposable income have a patriotic duty to spend. Accordingly, I binge shopped at a Dastkar handicrafts and handloom sale this week in Bengaluru. Those creating art in tie-and-dye shibori cloth counted among them Rajasthani women who had been trained more than a decade ago after years of breaking stones.

I came home feeling saintly instead of guilty. National service never seemed so pleasurable. Taking the metro would kill the vibe.

The author is a former Financial Times foreign correspondent.