India may soon see a new set of oil barons with lesser-known companies venturing into crude oil and natural gas production. These new kids on the block have come up through a mix of entrepreneurial grit and backing from oil industry veterans. Nippon Power, South Asia Consultancy, PFH (Poddar Family Holdings) Resources and Chennai-based Adbhoot Estates could be the first ones to start production from blocks awarded during the first round of Discovered Small Field (DSF-1) auctions. Adbhoot is in a 50:50 joint venture with the Bombay Stock Exchange-listed Hindustan Oil Exploration Company that has some five oil producing assets and over 10 blocks across the country.
Oil marketing companies IOC, BPCL and HPCL have invited expressions of interest from start-ups that wish to be enrolled as fuel entrepreneurs for doorstep delivery of high-speed diesel through mobile petrol pumps.
Ajit Mishra, vice president, Research, Religare Broking, answers your queries.
Besides, the BAI also recommended renowned National Institute of Sports (NIS)-certified coaches -- S Murlidharan and Bhaskar Babu -- for the Dronacharya Award.
Indian Oil till last month has automated more than 6,200 retail outlets and is planning to automate 7,500 more in the current fiscal across the country.
The demand, which had fallen by as much as 70 per cent, has since recovered after lockdown restrictions were eased beginning early May.
Petrol price on Saturday breached the Rs 83 per litre-mark in Delhi for the first time in more than two years after a rally in international oil prices forced a 13th increase in rates in the last fortnight. Petrol price on Saturday was raised by 27 paise per litre and diesel by 25 paise, according to a price notification of oil marketing companies. Petrol price in Delhi rose to Rs 83.13 per litre from Rs 82.86. Diesel rates went up from Rs 73.07 to Rs 73.32 per litre.
The earnings are, however, expected to be down around 2 per cent on a sequential basis due to pent-up demand getting exhausted and the adverse impact of rising metals and energy prices on consumer goods and manufacturing companies.
With the price of a cylinder touching Rs 800, it's becoming increasingly unaffordable to an already price-sensitive population, threatening to risk one of the most-celebrated campaigns of the Modi regime, reports Twesh Mishra.
"Under the CO-JEET" plan, personnel of the three wings of the armed forces -- the Army, the Indian Air Force and the Navy -- have been pressed into service to help restore oxygen supply chains, set up COVID beds and provide help to the civilian administration in its fight to control the pandemic," said the Lt General, whose post of deputy chief integrated defence staff (medical) comes under the Chief of Defence Staff.
'Indian and Iranian sources both confirmed to me that India and Iran are moving ahead to implement a payment system on buying oil from Iran and hope to finalise it very soon,' says Aveek Sen.
At the same time, the Cabinet approved reducing government's stake in select PSUs such as IOC to below 51 per cent while continuing to retain management control.
A swift recovery in oil demand in India is not only helping the stability of the global market, it is giving huge fiscal headroom to the government in terms of additional excise duty.
Soaring fuel prices give birth to a jugaad system in Bihar's border towns abutting Nepal with residents smuggling in India-supplied cheaper petrol and diesel from the mountain kingdom.
Given that the target was to reach 80.34 million families under PMUY - within three months starting April 1 - the government should have distributed at least 241.02 million cylinders by the end of June. It actually ended up distributing only 119.7 million cylinders.
Estimated to cost $44 billion, the project was expected to be commissioned by 2025.
Ajit Mishra, vice president, Research, Religare Broking, answers your queries.
This is the second straight increase in ATF price this month. Rates were hiked by a record 56.5 per cent (Rs 12,126.75 per kl) on June 1. Simultaneously, petrol and diesel prices were hiked for the 10th day in a row.
The ICC Cricket Committee, led by former India captain Anil Kumble, last month recommended a ban on using saliva on the ball as an interim measure to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.
Not surprisingly, equity investors are bidding-up stock prices across sectors and the broader market is now more valuable than pre-Covid levels.
This is the second hike in diesel price this month.
Manjunath (27), a sales officer with Indian Oil Corporation and a graduate from Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow, paid with his life for exposing an alleged petrol adulteration racket.
Nandigram, 126 km south of Kolkata, is Suvendu Adhikari's bastion, where he has vowed to defeat Mamata Banerjee by 50,000 votes or quit politics.
Hockey coach Ramesh Parameswaran applies for Dronacharya Award
The revision in rates announced by Indian Oil Corp is excluding VAT and the actual change will be higher after considering them
Divij Sharan has become not only India's number one but also the top-ranked Asian in the ATP doubles list with a recent three-place jump that took him to number 42 in the world.
Govt's move will facilitate entry of global giants such as Total SA of France, Saudi Arabia's Aramco, BP Plc of the UK, and Trafigura's downstream arm Puma Energy.
According to Mukesh Ambani, this is the country's largest bonus issue.
The company raised Rs 53,124 crore through a rights issue and sold nearly 33 per cent stake in Jio Platforms Ltd - the firm that houses telecom business and apps - to likes of Facebook and Google for Rs 152,056 crore.
The Indian Premier League Players' Auction auctions are always 'tricky' and going unsold does not make him feel frustrated, reveals Cheteshwar Pujara as he fights the public perception of being a red-ball specialist.
Market cap of government companies has remained unchanged in the past 8 years.
According to industry experts, the consumption of petroleum products in the month of April was only 30-40 per cent of what it had been prior to the lockdown. Due to this, refineries were forced to bring down their capacity too.
The oil crisis could not have come at a worse time for the Modi government as its tax collection has fallen short of its 2020-2021 target by Rs 5.2 lakh crore.
India on Tuesday pitched for a stake in vast oil and gas fields as well as LNG terminals in the frozen Artic of Far East Russia as it looked to import more oil from the former Soviet republic as part of a strategy to diversify its energy basket.
While seven companies bagged orders worth Rs 42,000 crore, industry experts said most of this new order activity was a spillover, and fresh project finalisation remains weak.
Out of the eight, five are state-run entities.
The three state-owned oil companies have decided to defer snapping fuel supplies to Air India. The airline owes the three firms over Rs 5,000 crore in past fuel bills.
In another development, SBI Capital Markets, which had issued the expressions of interest on April 8, extended the deadline for submission of initial bids to April 12.
A tough initial lockdown was imposed beginning March 25 but dreams of a V-shaped recovery after it was eased in May have been obliterated by a surge in cases and new lockdowns.
Ajit Mishra, vice president, Research, Religare Broking, answers your queries.
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