An Oil Ministry-controlled oversight panel that overseas operations at KG-D6 fields, today decided to approve annual operating and capital expenditure for fields that has been pending for past three years, sources said.
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Labayendu Mansingh, Chairman of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board, is an amicable yet tough man. In his 5 months as the petroleum & natural gas regulator, Mansingh announced to the oil & gas industry his intention of proving that the regulatory board is more than a toothless tiger. The board will come out with its first set of regulations, which will lay down rules for the distribution of gas to households, vehicles & industries in cities by middle of this month.
The Cabinet on Thursday decided to allow Reliance Industries to almost double the price of natural gas from April provided the firm gave a bank guarantee to cover its liability if gas-hoarding charges are proved.
Oil and Natural Gas Corporation ONGC will tie-up with Norway's state-owned oil firm Norsk Hydro to jointly explore for oil and gas in the Gulf region.
The wholesale price-based inflation declined to a 19-month low of 8.39 per cent in October, on easing prices of fuel and manufactured items. This is the first time in 19 months that WPI inflation print has come in single digit. Last was in March 2021 at 7.89 per cent. Since April 2021, WPI inflation remained in double digits for 18 months with September print at 10.79 per cent.
These firms are expected to incur an under-recovery of over Rs 121,000 crore (Rs 1,210 billion) during this financial year, compared to Rs 78,000 crore (Rs 780 billion) in 2010-11.
Oil ministry officials say it is unlikely that the government will accept the BK Chaturvedi Committee's recommendation for raising the retail prices of petrol and diesel as it faces general elections in less than a year. The move also risks putting pressure on inflation, which has already crossed a 13-year high.
Reliance Industries will have to provide a bank guarantee of $135 million every quarter to get a higher price for natural gas from April 1 next year.
Four Tornados took off from the Royal Air Force base in Akrotiri, Cyprus, shortly after the House of Commons vote gave the go-ahead for Britain to assist in the United States-led bombing of Islamic State.
The oil ministry is believed to have turned down Reliance Petroleum Ltd's request to export LPG from its newly commissioned refinery at Jamnagar in Gujarat, forcing the only-for-exports unit to sell the cooking fuel locally.
As crude oil prices hover around four-year lows, the government may look at slashing diesel prices further that will help cool inflation by lowering goods transportation charges.
Faced with the prospect of revenue loss on fuel jumping to Rs 700 billion (Rs 70,000 crore) next fiscal, Petroleum Ministry on Wednesday called for "harsh decisions" even as it hinted that cleaner Euro-IV fuel in 13 metro cities will cost more from April 1.
Oil firms will supply fuel to SpiceJet on 'cash and carry basis'.
Three fuel retailers -- Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited -- lost about Rs 26,618 crore (Rs 266.18 billion) in revenues on selling petrol, diesel, domestic LPG and kerosene below cost during the first half of the current fiscal, a ministry official said.
Minister of State for Shipping Pon Radhakrishnan said the vessel had more than 32,000 tonne of oil and has been emptied.
An $1 per barrel change in crude price impacts the net import bill by Rs 3,513 crore.
With Iran reaching an agreement on its nuclear programme, India is expected to be one of the major gainers.
The finance ministry has asked state-run oil companies to shell out an interim dividend of Rs 2,600 crore (Rs 26 billion) for the year to March 2003, a government official
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The government on Thursday sanctioned Rs 17,772 crore (Rs 177.72 billion) cash subsidy to fuel retailers like IOC to cover for half of the revenues they lost on selling diesel and cooking fuels below cost in the September quarter.
Diesel prices may be hiked by Rs 10 per litre over a 10-month period and kerosene rates increased by same quantum over the next two years if a proposal being mulled in the Oil Ministry is accepted.
The exhibition of artefacts -- in physical and digital formats -- will be done on the same floor level where the leaders' meetings will take place, and they will walk through this 'cultural corridor' while moving into and out of the summit room, official sources said.
The PSC provides for a financial audit -- checking of the contractor's accounts in order to verify the charges and credits, but not a performance audit that scrutinises efficacies of processes or technology used in the complex deep sea operations.
Though the government had earlier this year explicitly decided to compensate Indian Oil, Hindustan Petroleum and Bharat Petroleum for the losses they incur on selling domestic liquid petroleum gas and kerosene through public distribution system by way of oil bonds, the finance ministry has not issued any bonds for the three quarters.
China on Wednesday reacted sharply to the United States move to exclude it along with India from the list of countries exempted from sanctions for importing crude oil from Iran, saying it is opposed to any unilateral action without United Nations authorisation.
Financials were the top losers while oil shares also declined amid weak crude oil prices.
RP Singh, managing director of Bharat Oman Refineries Ltd, the special purpose vehicle implementing BPCL Bina refinery, had told Business Standard in August that the company was in talks with strategic investors to sell 15 to 20 per cent stake.
The government is set to dump B K Chaturvedi panel's recommendation for a monthly increase in fuel prices till they are at par with costs, but may accept the high-powered committee's suggestions for imposing a tax on oil produced from fields awarded before 1999.
Under pressure from his party, Oil Minister M Veerappa Moily said the government is considering increasing the quota of subsidised LPG cylinders to 12 per household even as hints were dropped of a one-time hike in diesel and LPG rates
The government may soon give the green light to bilateral trade between Russia and India in their national currencies to avoid any trade disruptions, multiple people aware of the matter said. While the Department of Commerce has recommended the proposal, an announcement is likely to be made by the finance ministry after further deliberations between the Department of Economic Affairs and Department of Financial Services. "The finance ministry will take a call on how to peg the two currencies," a senior government official told Business Standard. In the past, the two nations have had rupee-rouble trade, and when such an arrangement is implemented again, it will bypass the sanctions imposed on Russia by the West.
Wholesale price-based inflation spiked to a record high of 15.08 per cent in April on rising prices across segments from food to commodities. The WPI-based inflation was 14.55 per cent in March and 10.74 per cent in April last year. "The high rate of inflation in April 2022 was primarily due to rise in prices of mineral oils, basic metals, crude petroleum & natural gas, food articles, non-food articles, food products and chemicals & chemical products etc. as compared to the corresponding month of the previous year," the commerce and industry ministry said in a statement.
The seven-member grouping has seen two changes -- S Jaipal Reddy replacing Murli Deora after taking over as the Oil Ministry, while Kamal Nath has given away to the new Road Transport and Highways Minister C P Joshi.
Having failed to align cooking gas prices with the market and limit the number of subsidised cylinders to consumers, the government is now trying to curb the misuse of multiple connections in households.
A suicide car bomber attacked a police checkpoint, guarding several government ministries, as Iraqi employees arrived for work on Monday, killing at least 7 policemen and 3 workers, police said.
The petroleum ministry has sought additional oil bonds worth about Rs 13,000 crore (Rs 130 billion) to cover the revenue loss on fuel sale in the fourth quarter of the current fiscal.
Cairn's contractual term for exploring and producing oil from the Rajasthan Block RJ-ON-90/2 expires in 2020 and the area is to return to the block licensee, ONGC.
The Cabinet Committee of Economic Affairs has approved a hike in gas prices from April 2014.
Amid fast-depleting forex reserves, the Finance Ministry on Wednesday signalled that it was not in favour of selling the dollar to defend any particular level of the rupee. "Let it (rupee) reach whatever levels it has to reach. We can't fritter away reserves on defending some artificial, imaginary rate of exchange," a senior finance ministry official told Business Standard. Forex reserves declined to a near two-year low of $545.65 billion as on September 16, down $85.88 billion from the level that existed on February 25, a day after Russia invaded Ukraine.
Sale of diesel, the most consumed fuel in the country, fell 12 per cent, while petrol sales fell 7.4 per cent year-on-year to 2.38 million tonnes although it rose 5.3 per cent from 2.26 million tonnes in July as commuters preferred driving to using public transportation.