The government on Tuesday put 20 oil and gas exploration blocks for bidding under the fifth round of New Exploration Licensing Policy.
Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar will visit Dhaka and Yangon in January to explore the possibility of laying a natural gas pipeline from Myanmar to India via Bangladesh.
A Bill to put in place a regulator for the oil sector will be placed before the Cabinet for approval this month and presented to Parliament during the winter session, Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said.
The cabinet committee on economic affairs will meet this evening to decide on the prices of petrol, diesel, LPG and kerosene, petroleum minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said.
The government may cut customs duty on petrol and diesel by 5 per cent each to avoid increasing prices that had been necessitated due to a spurt in international oil prices.
The government on Tuesday ruled out any rollback of last month's increase in prices of petrol, diesel and LPG, and said a policy for pricing of major petroleum products was under review.
More than half of the retail selling price of petrol and one-third of the selling price of diesel is made up of central and state duties, Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said on Tuesday.
Petrol will cost less than Rs 18 a litre but for the duties levied by central and state governments, Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said on Tuesday.
India's net oil import bill has jumped 32 per cent to Rs 91,486 crore (Rs 914.86 billion) in the first 11 months of 2004-05 fiscal on back of high crude oil prices.
With the Gujarat going to the polls, name calling has peaked this election season with words like neech and Babar bhakt being flung around.
Escalating its attack against Mani Shankar Aiyar, the BJP called his remarks "treasonous" and demanded an apology from Congress chief Sonia Gandhi.
The editorial termed the decline in Sikhs and Buddhists numbers in religious data of Census as "worrisome" and said whenever indigenous faiths have declined separatist tendencies increase and called for concrete policy measures to correct it.
Petrol will cost Rs 17.46 per litre and diesel Rs 18.07 in Delhi if all duties and taxes on the two fuels are removed, Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said on Tuesday.
Many were hoping that with Vajpayee's NDA gone, there would be a return to the Congress normal. Nobody was prepared for the opposite. Sonia Gandhi was sceptical. This became the only issue over which Manmohan Singh took on his party bosses and risked his government. Politically, it was riskier than the 1991 reform, recalls Shekhar Gupta.
Sonia stated that it was not surprising that people would back one of their own, said Tharoor.
Singh issued a statement on Monday, listing those who attended the dinner, and stressed that the election was not discussed during the meeting.
He promised a complete loan waiver to farmers as soon as the Congress formed government in the state.
Tagging a tweet on the organisational changes by the party in Tamil Nadu, Karti Chidambaram tweeted, "These jumbo committees serve no purpose. 32 VP, 57 GS, 104 Secretaries. None will have any authority which means no accountability."
Rahul Gandhi on Thursday disapproved of personal attacks on Opposition leaders, indicating that the Congress leadership was not happy with Mani Shankar Aiyar's recent "chaiwala" jibe at BJP's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi.
'Surprised and pained that my name has been dragged into Indian domestic politics,' says Pakistan's former foreign minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri.
The imprudent, not to mention immature, attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi by Congress leaders, especially on the election trail, can only be read as a sign of nerves on the eve of an important poll battle.
Senior Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar also said that an alliance similar to the one stitched up in Bihar is needed at the national level for the next Lok Sabha elections.
Sachin has an attendance of 5.5 per cent to date, whereas Rekha has a meagre attendance rate of 5.1 per cent.
Amid the raging Israel-Hamas war, a group of opposition leaders, including MP Danish Ali and former parliamentarians Mani Shankar Aiyar and K C Tyagi, visited the Palestine Embassy in New Delhi on Monday to express solidarity with Palestinians.
A revealing excerpt from Mani Shankar Aiyar's fascinating new book, The Rajiv I Knew.
'While the meeting on December 6th was perfectly legal, was it ethical?' asks Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Unprecedented scenes were witnessed as Congress leaders sat on a dharna near the aircraft at the tarmac and raised slogans such as 'Jab jab Modi darta hai, police ke peeche chupta hai' and 'Tanashahi nahi chalegi'.
Rashtriya Janata Dal president Lalu Prasad Yadav had thrown barbs at the prime minister over his having no family.
Syed Firdaus Ashraf lists 10 instances when the BJP didn't pull its punches.
As a row erupted over his meeting with Mumbai terror attacks mastermind Hafiz Saeed, journalist Ved Pratap Vaidik, considered close to Baba Ramdev, on Monday rejected suggestions by Congress that he might have acted as government's envoy, saying he was "nobody's envoy but my own".
Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on Tuesday launched a blistering attack on Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray leader Uddhav Thackeray saying he buried the Hindutva ideology of Bal Thackeray for power and joined hands with Congress and socialist parties.
His five-year rule saw the Babri Masjid demolition, the rise of the saffron forces and also the country being placed firmly on a new economic path, away from the Nehru years of public sector socialism.
These protests helped the BJP, but it also helped the communal outfits, Ramesh said.
The G-23 group seems to have expanded with several senior Congressmen attending Wednesday's meeting.
Sonia Gandhi on Sunday hosted her first Iftar in three years, which saw the Congress president sharing a table with leaders of RJD and its new-found ally Janata Dal-United.
Union Minister Salman Khurshid on Tuesday described Narendra Modi as "impotent", a remark that invited a sharp condemnation from the BJP.
Congress spokesperson Shashi Tharoor, who has come under fire from party leaders for praising Narendra Modi, on Friday, got a piece of advice from party general secretary Digvijay Singh "not to jump to conclusions".
Arun Jaitley and Amit Shah and other ministers will listen to PM's radio talk 'Mann ki Baat' while having tea with people across poll-bound Gujarat on Sunday.
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