Oct. 6: With just nine days to go before the NELP-IX is unveiled, the delay in government taking a stand on the Cairn-Vedanta deal could be a ticklish issue as the petroleum ministry discovered in London on Thursday.
The entire top brass of India’s oil industry — led by the petroleum minister, petroleum secretary, ONGC’s chairman and several other dignitaries is currently in London. This is a part of the roadshow before the latest round of NELP (new exploration and licen-sing policy) is launched. In a lunch for prospective investors, the minister faced questions about the $8.5 billion Cairn-Vedanta deal.
However, speaking to this newspaper from London, the petroleum minister, Mr Murli Deora, said that the Cairn-Vedanta issue is unlikely to affect the resp-onse to NELP-IX. The deal is with the legal department of the government which is examining all the issues.
Incidentally, Cairn Plc’s chairman, Mr Bill Gammell, was also present at the lunch meeting. The minister would be meeting potential investors on Friday as well. India is offering about 35 exploration blocks for bidding in NELP-IX and some of them are new ones, especially deep sea drilling blocks west of the Andaman Islands. There are no coal bed methane blocks on offer this time. The roadshow will launch in London on October 15 and this time will include Moscow in its itinerary.
For years, Cairn Plc’s oil discoveries in Rajasthan have been a showpiece in the petroleum ministry’s attempts to bring in foreign investors to India’s oil sector. In mid-August, Cairn Plc announced that it will sell a controlling stake in Cairn India — which holds the prolific Rajasthan oil fields for $8.5 billion to Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta.
However, the firm hasn’t yet received the necessary clearances from the government. Meanwhile, an open offer for Cairn India’s shareholders, which was to be made by Mr Agarwal’s firm Sesa Goa, has now been delayed.