ONGC, which is a 30 per cent partner with Cairn India in the giant Rajasthan oil field, had claimed that it had preemption or right of first refusal in Cairn India assets, like the Rajasthan block.
Market regulator SEBI has not yet approved the open offer made by Vedanta Group to Cairn India shareholders, even as the target company formed a two-member panel to look into the offer made to minority shareholders.
Vodafone is facing tax liability over its $11 billion acquisition of a 67 per cent stake in the mobile-phone business owned by Hutchison Whampoa in 2007.
The proposed takeover of Cairn Energy's India business could see Non-Resident Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal emerging as the richest promoter of a corporate house in India ahead of Mukesh Ambani, who has ruled the list for long.
State-run Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) may seek management control of the giant Rajasthan oilfields in lieu of allowing UK's Cairn Energy to sell majority stake in its Indian arm that now operates the field, to a non-oil firm, Vedanta Resources for $8.48 billion.
Vedanta to file notice of claim in Cairn India tax case.
UK's Cairn Energy Plc has offered to forego $500 million and invest that amount in any oil and gas or renewable energy project identified by the Indian government if New Delhi agrees to honour an international arbitration award and returns the value of loss it incurred because of being taxed retrospectively, sources said. The Scottish firm invested in the oil and gas sector in India in 1994 and a decade later it made a huge oil discovery in Rajasthan. In 2006-07, it listed its Indian assets on the BSE. Five years after that the government passed a retroactive tax law and billed Cairn Rs 10,247 crore plus interest and penalty for the reorganisation tied to the flotation.
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has initiated discussions with banks to address financial stress in the telecom sector, particularly Vodafone Idea Ltd (VIL) that urgently requires fund infusion to stay afloat. There was a meeting of DOT officials and senior bankers on Friday on the issue of Vodafone, sources said, adding that banks have been asked to look for a solution within the prudential guidelines. According to sources, senior officials from the country's biggest lenders State Bank of India and Bank of Baroda were also present among others in the meeting. More such meetings are expected to take place in the coming days, they said.
Of the 10 coal bed methane blocks on offer, bids were received only for 8. RIL bid for one block. Of the 24 deep water blocks on offer, bids were received only for eight.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, in his Budget speech on Monday, announced a new dispute resolution mechanism for such companies who are in confrontation with the taxman's action.
Cairn files notice against India in $1.6 billion tax dispute.
As many as 44 shareholders of Flipkart sold their holdings to Walmart. The income tax law requires the buyer to withhold tax while making payment to the sellers, in case they are not exempted from levy of capital gains tax.
British oil firm Cairn Energy Plc on Tuesday said it has identified Indian sovereign assets overseas, which it can seize in the event of New Delhi failing to return over USD 1.7 billion that an international arbitration tribunal has ordered after rescinding a retrospective tax demand.
The company plans to begin drilling in Bihar's Gangetic basin by next year. It has completed the seismic surveys and is currently studying the data collected to understand the geological structures below the surface.
Cairn India, which found India's largest oil field in Rajasthan in over 30 years, has discovered a saline water reservoir near its oil field that will help pump crude oil to the ground level and enhance production.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday reiterated that an international arbitration ruling on India's sovereign right to taxation sets the wrong precedent, but said the government is looking at how best it can sort out the issue arising out of New Delhi being ordered to return $1.2 billion plus interest and cost to UK's Cairn Energy Plc. The government, which participated in an international arbitration brought by the Scottish firm against being taxed retrospectively, has appealed against The Hague based tribunal's ruling asking the government to return the value of shares expropriated and liquidated, tax refunds withheld and dividend seized to recover a wrongly levied retroactive tax demand.
The bill to nullify retrospective taxation offers a fair solution within the framework of Indian law and Parliamentary sovereignty to companies which have been subjected to such demands, Finance Secretary T V Somanathan said on Thursday. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman introduced 'The Taxation Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2021' in the Lok Sabha that seeks to withdraw tax demands made using a 2012 retrospective legislation to tax the indirect transfer of Indian assets. The Bill provides for the withdrawal of tax demand made on "indirect transfer of Indian assets if the transaction was undertaken before May 28, 2012 (i.e. the day the retrospective tax legislation came into being)."
Cairn India, which is developing the oilfields in Rajasthan discovered by its parent Cairn Energy in 2004, has started preliminary work on the pipeline to bring the oil to market, its chief executive said on Monday.
Government has approved Cairn Energy's one-billion dollar development plans for four of the 18 oil discoveries made by the British firm in its Rajasthan block.
Bihar is now poised to emerge as one of India's next major destinations for oil and natural gas reserves.
UK's Cairn Energy Plc plans to bring lawsuits in the US and other countries to pierce the corporate veil between the Indian government and its owned companies such as in oil and gas, shipping, airline and banking sectors, to seize their overseas assets to recover $1.2 billion ordered by an international arbitration tribunal. The firm has moved courts in the US, UK, Canada, France, Singapore, the Netherlands and three other countries to register the December 2020 arbitration tribunal ruling that overturned the Indian government's Rs 10,247 crore demand in back taxes and ordered New Delhi to return $1.2 billion in value of shares it had sold, dividends seized and tax refunds withheld to recover the tax demand. With the government so far refusing to honour the arbitration award and instead choosing to challenge it, Cairn is looking to enforce it by seizing overseas Indian assets, Dennis Hranitzky, head of the sovereign litigation practice at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, a law firm representing the company, told PTI.
More than 70 global energy firms, including ExxonMobil, Chevron Texaco, Conoco Phillip, BHP and Shell, lined up in Houston to have a sneak preview of India's latest offering of oil and gas blocks under the New Exploration Licensing Policy.
Oil explorer Cairn Energy Ltd has said it would invest $90 million, along with its joint venture partners, over the next nine months toward drilling activity at Ravva, the offshore oil and gas field in the KG Basin.
Cairn India, which is 69 per cent owned by London-listed Cairn Energy, is very close to securing the vital approval it needs to begin work on the pipeline to transport the oil from its vast Rajasthan oil fields, the Indian government has said.
Britain's Cairn Energy has secured a French court order to seize 20 Indian govt properties to recover arbitration award, it is learnt.
Cairn India has drawn strength from its Scottish parent, but also built new systems and processes to support its role in the country's oil sector.
Putting aside the plan for setting up a greenfield refinery in the state, Cairn Energy India, in a joint venture with ONGC, is planning to build a 500-km pipeline to evacuate crude oil from the Mangala, Bhagyam, and Aishwarya fields.
UK-based Cairn Energy PLC on Tuesday said it will drop litigations to seize Indian properties in countries ranging from France to the US, within a couple of days of getting a USD 1 billion refund resulting from the scrapping of a retrospective tax law.
UK-based Cairn Energy raised its estimates of oil at its three key Rajasthan fields, and said total potential production was now over 1,50,000 barrels per day.
Cairn Energy has received an 18-month extension for further appraisal of the over 2,884 square km acreage of the Rajasthan block, which preliminary estimates suggested would yield between 35-70 million barrels of oil.
UK-based oil firm Cairn Energy plans to create a separate unit out of its Indian operations and sell at least 25 per cent shares of the new firm through an initial public offering.
Petronas of Malaysia has picked up about 10 per cent stake in Cairn India Ltd, the subsidiary of Scottish oil firm Cairn Energy Plc, that is to be listed on Bombay Stock Exchange by the end of next month.
India is massively underexplored, says Rahul Shir, CEO, Cairn India.
Oil and Natural Gas Corporation is likely to abandon the proposed Rs 8,000 crore (Rs 80 billion) refinery at Barmer in Rajasthan if Cairn Energy declines discounts on the low grade crude oil the UK company will produce in the state.
In a most perverse example of tax bullying, someone I know has got by three such notices reopening his assessment minutes before the midnight deadline of June 30, reveals Debashis Basu.
Cairn Energy of UK has secured a $1 billion banking facility to fund its Rajasthan oil field development plan.