"Whatever subsidies we offer must be done in a transparent manner," Singh said launching the energy conservation campaign in New Delhi.

Regretting that in the past, private investment in the field of energy, particularly power, was encouraged without proper pricing and distribution policy, he said a "multi-faceted" approach on pricing in all forms of energy was the need of the hour.

Singh said the large amount of power theft was being sought to be covered under the garb of transmission and distribution losses as also free power to the rural sector and warned that free power was resulting in a dangerous depletion of ground water.

Seeking a national debate on economic utilisation of energy and rational pricing policy, the Prime Minister said that without this it would not be possible to address the issue of energy conservation, a must for achieving the goal of electrification of the entire nation in the next five years.

He said that 56 per cent of the rural household did not have access to electricity and in case of some states the figure was as high as up to 90 per cent.

Underscoring the importance of improving the quality of electricity to help increase the quantity, Singh cautioned against "blindly aping" the West and said that instead the developed countries should bring down their consumption to our level.