Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Monday said the surge in international oil prices is a matter of grave concern and it was for the petroleum ministry to take a call on retail pricing of petroleum products.
There are about 23 oil refineries in India with a combined capacity of 230 million tonnes per annum.
A parliamentary panel has asked the government to restrict imports of all petroleum products especially transportation fuels (petrol and diesel) by private firms in view of the excess refining capacity in the country.
The government cleared the proposal despite opposition from the petroleum ministry, which says this is not the right time for divestment as the sector is moving from trade parity to export parity pricing.
Petroleum Ministry is considering cutting down the number of independent directors on board in an oil PSU to 33%.
To help them make up for the revenue lost on selling auto and cooking fuel below cost.
The government has decided to observe January 23 as 'Parakram Diwas' to commemorate the birth anniversary of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, Union minister Prahlad Singh Patel said on Tuesday.
To prevent rise in air pollution levels, oil marketing companies and thermal power units were planning to procure stubble from farmers to make bioethanol and promote the central government's 'Agricultural Mechanization' for crop residue management. But both have seen minimal success.
India is currently the world's fourth-largest oil consumer after the United States, China and Japan
Import segments which recorded negative growth include gold, silver, transport equipment, coal, fertiliser, machinery and machine tools. However, exports of oil seeds, coffee, rice, tobacco, spices, pharma, and chemicals reported positive growth in June.
Imports too tumbled by 58.65 per cent to $17.12 billion in April from $41.4 billion in the same month last year, according to the data by the commerce and industry ministry.
Govt was vary of giving BJP-leader and Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi any kind of advantage on the eve of elections in the state.
Cumulative exports during April-August of 2017-18 rose by 8.57 per cent to $118.57 billion
Shell gets govt's nod to import petrol, diesel
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.
Declining crude price translates into lower under-recoveries for OMCs
The government on Monday budgeted Rs 1.75 lakh crore from stake sale in public sector companies and financial institutions, including 2 PSU banks and one general insurance company, in the next fiscal year beginning April 1. The amount is lower than the record Rs 2.10 lakh crore which was budgeted to be raised from CPSE disinvestment in the current fiscal year. However, the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the government's CPSE stake sale programme, and the target has been lowered to Rs 32,000 crore in the Revised Estimates.
Why does the world's fastest-growing major consumer of energy fail to attract investments in oil and gas? This is a question worth pondering after private sector conglomerate Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) failed to close a $15-billion downstream asset deal with Saudi Arabia's national oil company, Aramco. It's understandable if multi-billion dollar investments in oil and gas projects or deals involving state companies that need to traverse a complex bureaucracy at state and federal levels and the corridors of ministries unravel. However, Mukesh Ambani-run RIL, India's most successful energy company, is not typically known to fumble on closing deals (Ambani closed deals worth around Rs 2 trillion early last year in telecom and retail with blue chip investors).
The Government may be keen on having a greater say in affairs of Petronet LNG as it is looking at appointing a bureaucrat as director on board of the nation's biggest liquefied natural gas importer.
As many as 12,394 complaints of alleged corruption were received against railway employees.
Reaching a consensus might also get tougher, as already seen with issues like inclusion of natural gas in GST and imposition of a sugar cess, both central proposals being resisted.
'There exists a 'brotherhood' of sorts for a very long time and corrupt dealers and corrupt OMC officials are in it together,' Ashwani Attrish, founder, Empowering Petroleum Dealers Foundation, tells Sudhir Bisht, a veteran of the petroleum industry.
Scandal is a result of callous administrative approach.
Valuers have found almost no assets to pay for their claims against the Videocon group that entered the insolvency process in 2018. But the dissenters suggest that the money is elsewhere, possibly in the group's oil and gas assets, which are not part of the group's bankruptcy case.
Petroleum ministry expects that this would encourage the rich and affluent also to voluntarily give up the subsidised LPG.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will retain DoPT, Atomic Energy as well as all important policy issues and portfolios not allocated.
The government is unlikely to take up the issue of reducing petrol, diesel and domestic LPG prices on Thursday as consultations on petroleum ministry's simultaneous proposal for freeing auto fuel pricing were not complete.
With only months to go for the general elections, the new environment minister has gone into overdrive to clear projects.
Every dollar increase in crude oil price will add Rs 4,000 crore to the overall underrecovery.
A day after Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to forestall political attempts to throttle his oil refinery business, the petroleum ministry has come out with a detailed presentation to show that the demand for the windfall profits tax (WPT) on private oil companies is 'short-sighted populism' and 'bad economics.'
'We began foolishly bragging about Saudi-Emirati investment plans as indicative of the sheikhs 'distancing' from Pakistan, including on Kashmir,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Department of Economic Affairs secretary Atanu Chakraborty said that equity capital flows have been positive this year.
The storm is likely to impact Mumbai, Thane and other coastal districts of Maharashtra like Raigad and Palghar along with Valsad, Navsari, Surat, Bhavnagar and Bharuch districts of Gujarat and Union Territory of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu. Preparations for the impending cyclone were discussed at a meeting of the National Crisis Management Committee (NCMC), headed by Cabinet Secretary Rajiv Gauba, a home ministry statement said.
The Oil and Natural Gas Corporation may face delisting from stock exchanges as a petroleum ministry directive appointing additional government directors on company board has violated its listing agreement.
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