Gas Limit not getting increased

[mgroovyank]

I'm trying to make a transaction on my contract deployed here:
https://sepolia.etherscan.io/tx/0xcaedf27303409d7b7625e0b592810a2b60097320e3f3ff3898ae6790daba1e2c

But it is getting reverted with out of gas error. Even after increase gas parameter value from 200000 to 500000, I see the gas limit for the transaction to be the same as 296,658 . Please help me out here. I've added my hardhat.config.js as well below.

require("@nomicfoundation/hardhat-ethers");
require("@nomicfoundation/hardhat-chai-matchers");
require("hardhat-deploy");
require("hardhat-deploy-ethers");
require("dotenv").config();
const SEPOLIA_RPC_URL = process.env.SEPOLIA_RPC_URL;
const SEPOLIA_PRIVATE_KEY = process.env.SEPOLIA_PRIVATE_KEY;
const ARBITRUM_RPC_URL = process.env.ARBITRUM_RPC_URL;
const ARBITRUM_PRIVATE_KEY = process.env.ARBITRUM_PRIVATE_KEY;

module.exports = {
  solidity: {
    compilers: [
      {
        version: "0.8.24",
      },
      {
        version: "0.8.19",
        settings: {
          optimizer: {
            enabled: true,
            runs: 1000,
          },
        },
      },
    ],
  },
  defaultNetwork: "hardhat",
  networks: {
    localhost: {
      url: "http://127.0.0.1:8545/",
    },
    sepolia: {
      url: SEPOLIA_RPC_URL,
      accounts: [SEPOLIA_PRIVATE_KEY],
      chainId: 11155111,
      blockConfirmations: 3,
      gas: 500000,
    },
    arbitrum: {
      url: ARBITRUM_RPC_URL,
      accounts: [SEPOLIA_PRIVATE_KEY, ARBITRUM_PRIVATE_KEY],
      chainId: 421614,
      blockConfirmations: 6,
    },
  },
  namedAccounts: {
    deployer: {
      default: 0,
      1: 0,
    },
  },
};

[mgroovyank]

I had to use await execute() function provided by hardhat-deploy plugin's deployments helper. That helped to override gas limit while making the transaction.