BUT raising administered prices, a very convenient revenue-raising tool for the Government, is also the most unpopular one, as the anti-petroproduct price rise demonstrations across the country have shown. But why have these government-controlled prices at all in so many sectors? And there may anyway be an inherent flaw in the Government's formula of basing these prices on the costs of producing and distributing these items. For, as S. Gangopadhyay, professor, Indian Statistical Institute, points out, these costs may themselves hide several inefficiencies. To take a random example, if the cost of an LPG cylinder is actually Rs 180 in the public sector, some 20 per cent of it may be due to hidden sectoral inefficiencies. On the other hand, if the private sector is already importing LPG and selling it at Rs 180 and the Government is supplying a cylinder at 35 per cent less, this is an obviously unnecessary subsidisation. Secondly, and more importantly, such a regime goes against the grain of liberalisation, by disallowing competition.