Get serious about energy efficiency

Union finance minister P. Chidambaram did well to make it clear at the conference of oil producers and consumers in Jeddah that it was not the rising demand for oil in India and other developing countries that was contributing to the spiralling rise in crude prices. It is unfair to blame India's demand for crude oil as one of the reasons for the spike in crude prices. India's growth story is not a six-month-old story or even a one-year-old story. Crude prices have gone up by $140 a barrel in just a year, and by almost 40 per cent in the past six months.