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Mid-term appraisal: Manmohan sees slower growth
New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has scaled down the economic growth rate during the plan period to 7-8 per cent from 8 per cent projected earlier.

Addressing the inaugural day of the crucial two-day meeting of the National Development Council (NDC) convened to approve the mid-term appraisal of the Tenth Five-year Plan, the Prime Minister said: "We cannot achieve the original plan target of eight per cent growth. The mid-term appraisal shows that performance thus far is well below this target, averaging 6.5 per cent in the past three years. The UPA government has set a revised target of 7-8 per cent for the remaining two years of the Tenth Plan (2002-07)."

Singh pointed at the poor performance of agriculture, which had been growing by a mere 1.5 per cent over the past three years, as the root cause holding back the economic growth. "Unfortunately, the performance of agriculture appears to have deteriorated and possibly would not exceed 1.5 per cent growth during the Tenth Plan," he added.

Singh said the cornerstone of the plan strategy was a reversal of the declining trend to achieve 4 per cent growth in the agricultural sector. But he lamented that this had not been achieved over the last three years.

The Prime Minister exhorted the chief ministers to explore the possibilities of doubling farm output in the 10 years for which he suggested the constitution of an NDC sub-committee to undertake concrete action. On the problem-ridden infrastructure front, the Prime Minister referred to the vital need to overcome power shortages that is plaguing practically all states and creation of environment for attracting both public and private investment in the sector.

Outlining the positive aspects of the economy, Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia said: "Inflation, which was a concern in mid-2004, is now under control, industrial growth had picked up recording 8.1 per cent growth, savings rate is high and fiscal deficit has been under checked."
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Infrastructure growth slips to 5.6 per cent in May
New Delhi: Infrastructure growth in May this year has slowed down to 5.6 per cent, compared to 6.7 per cent in the same month a year ago, following a poor show by the crude oil and refining sectors.

A sharp recovery by the coal and electricity generation sectors, both of which recorded double digit growth, coupled with moderate growth by the cement and finished steel sectors managed to keep overall growth of the six core industries in positive territory.

Refinery throughput during May 2005 stood at 9.611 million tonnes as opposed to 10.234 million tonnes a year ago. Cumulative refining production in April-May 2005 at 18.55 million tonnes decreased 6.9 per cent from 13.6 per cent growth in the corresponding period a year ago. Coal output at 30.7 million tonnes was better than 27.6 million tonnes production in the year ago month. Production during April-May this year at 61.2 million tonnes grew 9.7 per cent from 5.1 per cent in the same period last year.

The country generated 53.027 million units of electricity in May 2005, much higher than 47.981 million units in the previous year. Cumulative power generation at 103.44 million units in April-May this year grew 6.7 per cent, marginally lower than the growth of 6.8 per cent a year ago.

Cement production stood at 11.29 million tonnes against 10.95 million tonnes.
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GSPC gas find: Assessment to take 14 days
New Delhi: The Director-General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) has said that it would take at least a fortnight to estimate the size of the gas reservoir in Krishna-Godavari Basin (KG Basin) where Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation Ltd (GSPC) has discovered gas.

According to him, the discovery of gas is at a depth of about 4,700 metres and water depth is at around 80 metres.

GSPC, on Sunday, said it has discovered an estimated 20 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves in an offshore exploration block in the Bay of Bengal. This comes close on the heels of ONGC announcing that it has made a significant gas discovery in the shallow waters of the KG Basin.

ONGC had said that gas was struck in a well drilled on the GS-15 prospect, located southwest of the Ravva oilfield, which was discovered by ONGC in 1987. The site is around 12 kilometres from the Amalapuram coast in Andhra Pradesh. The well was spudded on May 28 at a depth of 17.8 metres with a target depth of 2,500 metres. ONGC has indicated a significant hydrocarbon column or pay zone of around 45 metres at a depth of 1,684 metres to 1,760 metres.

Industry players said that if the reserves in the KG basin are proven, the GSPC discovery would be India's largest ever gas find. The domestic gas output of around 80 million cubic meters a day meets only about 60 per cent of its demand.

GSPC was awarded the shallow water block under the Government's third round of New Exploration Licensing Policy. India imports around 76 per cent of the crude of it processes.
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India's moon mission to carry three European payloads
Bangalore: ISRO's lunar mission coming up in 2007-08 will carry three scientific payloads from premier European institutes. ISRO and the European Space Agency signed an agreement for this today.

The agreement allows Indian and ESA scientists to share data from these instruments.

Three experimental payloads from British, German, and Swedish research institutes will fly aboard the spacecraft.

Europe will also contribute to the Indian high-energy X-ray spectrometer while ESA instruments will complement ISRO experiments, an ISRO release said.

The ESA Director-General, Dr Jean-Jacques Dordain, and the ISRO chief, Madhavan Nair, signed the agreement. Nair said that ISRO was awaiting US clearance for NASA's ice detecting payload to fly on the mission.

The unmanned orbiting Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, weighing 525 kg, will be launched by the domestic PSLV launcher.

The European payloads include a low-energy X-ray spectrometer from the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, UK; a near-infra-red spectrometer from Max Planck Institute of Aeronomie, Germany, to detect lunar minerals; and a reflecting analyser from the Swedish Institute of Space Physics, developed in collaboration with India.

Indian instruments include a terrain mapping camera, a hyper spectral imager, a lunar laser ranging instrument and an impact probe.
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