Finance, oil ministry tussle over exports.
Delhi police on Saturday filed chargesheet against 13 persons arrested in connection with the petroleum ministry document leak case.
Problems at refineries, higher home demand for automobile fuels among main reasons.
The Communist Party of India-Marxist on Thursday claimed S Jaipal Reddy has paid the price for "defying the country's biggest corporate" by being shifted out of the petroleum ministry and said this exposed "the tentacles of big business in the appointment of ministers".
The shifting of S Jaipal Reddy from the petroleum ministry and elevation of Salman Khurshid on Monday kicked up a political storm with parties suspecting the government of coming under corporate pressure and accusing it of promoting those facing corruption charges.
India is estimated to spend $1.36 billion more a year for every one dollar a barrel increase in crude oil prices, says Subhayan Chakraborty.
Some of them have ambitious plans to fight the slowdown, while some would seek to revive their image.
OMCs' Digital India move is likely to have an impact on more than 80.3 million Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana consumers, majority of whom are not exposed to digital transact.
Domestic output is stagnating and the expensive LNG will meet the rising energy demand of the growing economy.
Price of diesel, LPG and kerosene will have to go up.
If the reforms are implemented, multi-brand retail majors such as Future Group and Reliance Retail might enter the fuel retail space.
Reliance and its partner BP on Tuesday dropped a bombshell, saying KG-D6, the country's biggest gas discovery, might stop production in 2015 if the government did not approve its long-pending investment proposals and revised capital expenditure plans.
The cap on cylinders would burden the Centre, which will need to compensate the states for the increased cooking fuel cost.
The Prime Minister's Office on Thursday forwarded to Oil and Petroleum Ministry a letter written by Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in which he has demanded that the decision to hike gas price extracted from KG basin be kept in abeyance till completion of a probe into the issue.
The prohibition has freed up as much as 60 million litres of ethanol
Apart from the central ministries, other respondents include oil marketing companies, Indian Oil Corporation, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd.
Petrol price is to go up by 30 paisa per litre, diesel by 18 paisa as government decides to hike petrol pump dealers commission.
Violation of the provisions entails a punishment of a jail term of up to five years or with fine up to Rs one crore or with both.
Petroleum ministry expects that this would encourage the rich and affluent also to voluntarily give up the subsidised LPG.
Meanwhile, Uttarakhand, Kerala and Delhi have already announced cut in value added tax on petrol.
Cairn India had written to the petroleum ministry about its plans for the block, said a person close to the development.
The Petroleum Ministry has asked the oil regulator to look into the marketing margin charged by not just Reliance Industries, but also state-owned GAIL India Ltd on the sale of domestic gas and imported LNG.
Time opportune before state polls as inflation is moderating.
The petroleum ministry has asked for a total compensation of Rs 60,000 crore (Rs 600 billion) to cover the subsidy portion till the third quarter of the current financial year.
It is expected to take a similar stand at the Mumbai and Delhi high courts, where Welspun Maxsteel, Ispat Industries and Essar Steel have challenged the petroleum ministry's decision to divert KG-D6s supply from steel and petrochemicals to power and fertiliser.
Petroleum secretary G C Chaturvedi said the arbitration notice grants a time of up to a month to respond and there was no hurry.
The consumption of petroleum products in India is growing at a rate much lower than the conservative projection of 4.58 per cent made for this year by the Petroleum Products Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC), a wing of the petroleum ministry.
The 12-digit unique number that the UIDAI will generate will be combined with the the smart card project of the Oil Ministry for distribution of PDS kerosene and domestic LPG through biometric identification of beneficiaries.
The decision was taken at a meeting last month chaired by additional secretary Sudhir Bhargava and attended by representatives of GAIL and the three OMCs - Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum.
Following decontrol of its price, the consumption of petrol is rising at a much slower rate than used to be the case.
The ministry had recently promised these dealers to increase their commission by Rs 397 per kilolitre (kl) on petrol and Rs 170 per kl on diesel. Dealers now get a commission of Rs 1,230 per kl on petrol and Rs 730 per kl on diesel.
Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), the operator of the KG-D6 gas block, has told the government it cannot comply with its latest directive on prioritising gas supply.
The Petroleum Ministry may have watered down its preconditions for approving mining group Vedanta Resources' acquisition of Cairn India, but the $9.6 billion deal will still hinges on no-objection from partner ONGC.
"I am not of the view that diesel price deregulation is inevitable and that is the position taken by petroleum ministry right now. Given the inflationary situation right now, we don't want to do that...," chief economic adviser Kaushik Basu told reporters on the sidelines of a CII event here.
Clearing the last hurdle, the Union home ministry has given unconditional approval for United Kingdom's BP to buy a 30 per cent stake in Reliance Industries' oil and gas blocks, including the showcase KG-D6 gas fields, for $7.2 billion.
Govt notification on $8.4 a unit price likely by month-end
Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, is also believed to be in favour of decontrolling auto fuel prices to limit the government's subsidy outgo but a decision is unlikely in the next 7-10 days as United Progressive Alliance managers build political consensus on the issue, an oil ministry official said.
Sources said both Mukherjee and Deora were in favour of Rs 2-3 a litre hike in petrol and diesel prices and Rs 25 per cylinder increase in LPG rates.
The Congress core group is meeting later in the evening where the implementation of Kirit Parikh Committee report on fuel pricing reforms may be discussed.
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