-PTI NEW DELHI: The Cabinet will on Thursday decide on raising natural gas prices for the first time in three years even as the move faces stiff resistance as it would result in rise in electricity tariff and fertiliser cost. The oil ministry's proposal to price all domestically produced natural gas as per a complex international hub and imported LNG-based formula suggested by the Rangarajan panel is listed as item number 8...

-The Hindu While the focus is on pilgrims, nobody is talking about the fate of boys and men who came from their villages in the Mandakini valley to earn during the yatri season It is one week since Uttarakhand's worst disaster in living memory. Flash floods resulting from extremely intense rainfall swept away mountainsides, villages and towns, thousands of people, animals, agricultural fields, irrigation canals, domestic water sources, dams, roads, bridges, and...

-The Hindu There has to be a national mission to ensure that rural homes have access to clean cooking Fuel and stoves instead of the killer chulhas that are claiming the lives of large numbers of women A large section of our country's population, nearly 75 per cent of rural and 22 per cent of urban households, still uses biomass for daily cooking. An estimated 80 per cent of the residential energy...

-The Times of India CHENNAI: A tight vigil against diversion of subsidized Fuel meant for domestic use seems to be paying off. The consumption of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), commonly called cooking gas, has started to dip since government capped sale of subsidized cylinders to every household and for the first time ever, sales have fallen for two successive months in comparison to the corresponding period of the previous year. Consumption...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The poor in rural areas spend only Rs 17 per day while those living in cities and towns spend Rs 23 a day, a government survey has revealed. The bottom 5% of the population had an average monthly per capita expenditure of Rs 521.44 in rural areas and Rs 700.50 in urban areas, according to National Sample Survey (NSS) data for 2011-12 (July-June). The top 5% of...