The matter may be incorporated in the National Energy Policy, Finance Minister M Saifur Rahman told reporters after an inter-ministerial meeting yesterday.

"Nowhere in the world people cook rice in gas burners [with piped gas]. They widely use cylinder gas for domestic purposes," Saifur observed.

"A huge amount of gas is wasted by domestic users. Housewives do not switch off the burner after cooking to save a matchstick and often dry clothes using gas burners," the minister said citing an example of gas wastage.

Mahmudur Rahman, advisor to the energy ministry, said, "Using piped gas for domestic purposes is a luxury, everywhere in the world cylinder gas is used in households."

Citing an instance of misuse of gas, he said people even use gas to dry rice in Brahmanbaria, Bhairab and Narayanganj areas.

To stop such wastage the government is going to change the energy policy to encourage use of gas cylinder for domestic purposes, he added.

Speaking at a roundtable at Sonargaon Hotel yesterday, Mahmudur Rahman urged the NGOs to create awareness among the gas users on how to save the national resource.

About 17 percent gas is consumed for domestic purposes and the introduction of cylinder system will save huge amount of gas on this front, he observed.

About 50 percent gas is used for power generation and only 15 percent for industrial use, he said, adding that if the coal reserves in the North Bengal could be used for power generation, more gas could be used in industries.

"There will be more foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country if more gas could be provided for the industries," he added.

Blasting the trade unions of Titas Gas, he said there is a nexus between some corrupt employees and some businessmen in the private sector that manipulates gas bills.

Mahmudur, also the executive chairman of Board of Investment (BoI), said the Indian company Tata which has proposed for setting up a coal-based power plant in Bangladesh will not export electricity to India.

"Tata has planned to use 500 MW electricity for itself and the rest 500 MW to sell to the government from its planned 1000 MW plant," he clarified.

The newly appointed energy adviser said Petrobangla's assumption that the reserved gas will exhaust by the next 15 years is not right.

"The reserved gas can be used for the next 25 years if we use coal for power generation and check gas wastage," he said. "I believe, more gas fields will be explored."