India’s ongoing LPG supply disruption, triggered by geopolitical tensions in West Asia, is beginning to show up in the country’s technology parks. Across several large IT campuses, companies have begun adjusting cafeteria services while also improvising work arrangements to adapt to the situation.
Major IT hubs, including Bengaluru, Chennai and Pune, companies such as Infosys, HCLTech, TCS and Cognizant have scaled back on-campus food services as commercial LPG supplies tighten.
At Infosys, live cooking counters have been shut, with menus reduced to items that require minimal or no gas-based cooking.
“Most of the hot food is gone,” said a software engineer at Infosys’ Bengaluru campus. “You either get something very basic or you carry food from home.” Cognizant has gone a step further, informally encouraging employees to adopt a “bring your own food” approach, as part of contingency planning around fuel shortages.
At TCS and Wipro campuses, employees report that cafeteria offerings have been reduced to limited rice-based meals and pre-prepared items.
The disruption has, in some cases, extended beyond food. One of the major IT companies temporarily asked employees at its Chennai facility to work from home after cafeteria vendors were unable to operate due to a lack of LPG supply.
Vendors under pressure
The immediate stress point lies not within IT firms themselves, but in their vendor ecosystem.
Corporate cafeterias, which rely heavily on commercial LPG cylinders, have struggled to maintain operations as supplies are diverted towards households.
“Kitchen vendors are the worst hit,” said Narayana Rao, a facilities executive working with IT parks in Bengaluru. “They don’t have the scale or backup systems to switch fuels quickly. So menus shrink, or operations pause.”
Some companies are attempting to adapt by shifting to electric cooking appliances or sourcing food from external kitchens that rely less on LPG, Rao said.
The broader LPG crisis has been driven by supply disruptions through key global routes, particularly the Strait of Hormuz, leading the government to prioritise household consumption over commercial use.
For the IT sector, this has translated into inconvenience rather than crisis.