The government has said it has taken an in-principle decision to link diesel prices with market rates, However, there is no proposal at present to fully deregulate cooking gas price. Minister of State for Finance, Namo Narain Meena said this in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha yesterday. While petrol prices are market-linked, the government fixes the rates of LPG, kerosene and diesel, which results in a large budgetary expenditure on subsidies. Mr. Meena said, the government continues to fix the price of diesel in order to shield the common man from the impact of rising crude oil prices and the resultant inflation. Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee later told reporters, that the in-principle decision to deregulate the price of diesel was taken in June last year.