-The Telegraph Public sector oil marketing companies yesterday raised the prices of diesel sold to bulk consumers like the railway and defence by Rs 1.20 a litre despite protests in Parliament last week. At the same time, oil companies reduced the price of domestic non-subsidised cooking gas by Rs 38 for a 14.2 kg cylinder. Following the revision, cooking gas will be sold at Rs 933 a cylinder in Calcutta and neighbouring areas...

-PTI Claiming that the "downturn is more or less over", the pre-Budget Economic Survey on Wednesday projected an optimistic 6.1 to 6.7 per cent growth in the next fiscal and made a strong call for cutting subsidises. While pegging the GDP growth at an estimated 5 per cent for the current fiscal, the Survey tabled in Parliament by finance minister P Chidambaram said "...the overall economy is expected to grow in the...

-The Hindu In his article in The Hindu (editorial page, “Making a mockery of domestic gas pricing,” January 18, 2013, Surya P. Sethi attacks the gas pricing formula proposed by the Rangarajan Committee, curiously enough, for being based on numbers from foreign markets that do not reflect the supply, demand or cost of production in India. I say “curiously” because on the exact opposite side, domestic producers are also pillorying the committee’s...

-The Hindustan Times The government is hoping to substantially negate the political fallout of higher diesel and cooking gas (subsidised LPG cylinder) prices by doubling the cap on the number of subsidised LPG cylinders from six to 12 a year. A proposal to this effect has  been readied for a final decision by the Cabinet, a senior government official confirmed to HT. Such a move will “substantially mollify” people who are...

-The Hindu Subsidies on cooking gas, kerosene and diesel have resulted in perverse outcomes not envisaged when they were introduced With the Aadhaar-based direct cash transfer scheme facing so many glitches in implementation, any hopes that the country’s energy sector can soon dismount the subsidy tiger it has been riding so dangerously have receded into the background. Had the Aadhaar scheme worked satisfactorily, the next logical step would have been to extend...