In a relief to senior Indian Police Service (IPS) officer Sanjay Kundu, the Supreme Court on Friday set aside the Himachal Pradesh high court direction to remove him from the post of state Director General of Police over allegations that he tried to pressure a businessman who claimed to have received a threat to his life from his partners.
The oil ministry is believed to have turned down Reliance Petroleum Ltd's request to export LPG from its newly commissioned refinery at Jamnagar in Gujarat, forcing the only-for-exports unit to sell the cooking fuel locally.
Indian Oil raised prices of commercial LPG, sold in 19 kg cylinders, to Rs 1,108.5 per cylinder on Nov 1, from Rs 1,095.24 per cylinder on Oct 1. Commercial LPG is not subsidised and oil companies revise their prices in line with international prices on the first of every month. "Commercial LPG prices are expected to go up in December too," said an IO official. But prices of automobile LPG have come down by around 5.34 per cent on Nov 1 compared with prices on Oct 1.
Limiting the supply of subsidised LPG cylinders is likely to save the government over Rs 12,000 crore in subsidy outgo annually.
Demanding a roll back of the hike in cooking gas price, that was increased by Rs 20 per cylinder yesterday, CPI (M) said the Centre's decision not to touch import duties on petroleum products will lead to an "anomalous" situation.
The Election Commission on Wednesday strongly disapproved Oil Minister Veerappa Moily's announcement of raising subsidised LPG quota ahead of Gujarat elections and asked him to be circumspect in future.
After reducing duties on petroleum products, the Centre has now asked the states to follow suit.
The proposal had to be routed through the transport department. "We were having discussions with the department and were hopeful of a mandate being passed for converting these vehicles to alternate fuel sources," said M L Meena, principal secreatary, department of environment, west Bengal.
The Sikkim Government has confirmed that 14 people have died so far in the flash floods that occurred in Sikkim in the early hours of Wednesday.
The state-owned refiner has offered 15,000 tonnes in a tender.
The government should end subsidised domestic cooking gas (LPG) for people with income of more than Rs 6 lakh per annum, a Parliamentary Panel has suggested.
Congress president and United Progressive Alliance Chairperson Sonia Gandhi has directed all party-ruled states to subsidise three additional cylinders a year for domestic liquefied petroleum gas, raising the cap on subsidised cylinders from six to nine.
The party also promised reservation to minorities on basis of their population after the caste census.
Here are the main factors that impact the November 23 elections in the state.
In order to cripple and check the activities of wilful tax defaulters, the Income Tax department has decided to "block" Permanent Account Number (PAN) of such entities, get their LPG subsidy cancelled and take measures to ensure that they are not sanctioned loans.
Underrecovery from sensitive petroleum products seen at Rs 1,55,000 cr in current fiscal.
Taking suo moto cognisance of reports of the Centre's move -- ahead of Gujarat assembly polls -- to increase the cap on subsidised LPG cylinders, the Election Commission has directed it to stop the same forthwith. The Commission held an emergency meeting soon after the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas M Veerappa Moily said the government will raise the cap on the supply of subsidised cooking gas to nine cylinders per household a year from six at present.
The LPG model was launched a fortnight ago. Chevrolet is now hoping to rev up the car's sales with a diesel option in June.
Now, non-subsidised liquefied petroleum gas price is hiked by Rs 26.5 per 14.2-kg cylinder.
Raise the price of diesel and restrict supply of subsidised LPG cylinder in a year to four per family, Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Panel suggested on Friday.
The government on Tuesday ruled out any further increase in diesel and cooking fuel prices even though the current retail rates are lower than their cost of production.
The government is mulling building a Rs 2,760 crore (Rs 27.60 billion) strategic storage facility by 2007-08 to stock 45-days requirement of liquefied petroleum gas as cover for emergencies.
A CNN-IBN Urban India Ooinion Poll shows the recent economic reform move of the government has not gone down well with the urban India. The poll shows that while the price rise and corruption remain the major concerns for the urban India, there is also a massive anger over cap on LPG subsidy and diesel price hike among the people across the cities.
According to DMK, the voters are already consolidated on ideological lines, hence the impact of anti-incumbency, whether against the BJP Centre or the DMK state may not be too much, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd is to set up three liquefied petroleum gas bottling plants with an investment of Rs 55 crore (Rs 550 million) even as it plans to introduce the 5-kg LPG cylinders in the urban areas.
As other members of the government have pointed out -- Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh and Chief Economic Advisor Kaushik Basu among them -- India cannot afford to delay increasing prices, given the ballooning subsidy bill.
The seeding of LPG database with Aadhar numbers is above 55 per cent and overall Aadhar penetration is 90 per cent in these districts.
The three state-owned fuel retailers have been "directed to stop supplies of LPG refills to households having multiple- connections for which no KYC (Know Your Customer) details have been received, with effect from June 1," a statement issued by Indian Oil Corporation, the nation's largest oil firm, said.
In most parts of the landlocked northeastern state, items such as rice, potato, onion and egg besides LPG cylinders and petrol are selling at rates much above the ones fixed by the government.
The government also withdrew the five per cent VAT on compressed natural gas besides bringing back the VAT for tea, coffee and cocoa to five per cent from the proposed 12.5 per cent.
With rupee falling to new lows, losses on diesel and cooking fuel have widened to their highest levels this year, upsetting the government's subsidy maths.
The government on Monday constituted an inter-ministerial task force under UIDAI chairman Nandan Nilekani for evolving mechanisms to provide direct subsidies on kerosene, cooking gas and fertilisers to intended beneficiaries.
The government on Friday decontrolled petroleum prices to bring fuel costs in line with global oil rates after an Empowered Group of Ministers, headed by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, met for the second time in less than three weeks to decide on raising fuel prices. Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee was absent again.
Time opportune before state polls as inflation is moderating.
Modi said there has been a 'silent revolution'.
Gandhi also raised the issue of rising prices of LPG cylinders and said crores of beneficiaries of the Ujjawala scheme are not able to afford a refill.
Referring to long-pending insurance bill, he said "we are on the verge" of opening the sector a little more.
The decision was taken at a full commission meeting held on Thursday under the chairmanship of Chief Election Commissioner V S Sampath, and communicated to the Union Cabinet, which met to take a call on the matter.
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