Ban of Indian firms from bid round sought

Royal Dutch Shell PLC, ExxonMobil Corp., and BP PLC are seeking to ban India's state-held Oil & Natural Gas Corp. (ONGC) and privately held Reliance Industries Ltd. from bidding on oil and gas blocks in the latest round of India's New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP-VI).

April 24, 2006

Shirish Nadkarni
OGJ Correspondent

MUMBAI, Apr. 24 -- Royal Dutch Shell PLC, ExxonMobil Corp., and BP PLC are seeking to ban India's state-held Oil & Natural Gas Corp. (ONGC) and privately held Reliance Industries Ltd. from bidding on oil and gas blocks in the latest round of India's New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP-VI).

Bids for NELP-VI are due in September.

The oil majors say ONGC and Reliance hold too many exploration blocks.

The majors largely avoided the previous five auctions due to aggressive bidding by the Indian firms. However, NELP-VI has attracted their attention in the wake of major gas strikes by Reliance and the ONGC-Cairn Energy combine in the Bay of Bengal. Cairn Energy also reported large oil finds in the northwestern state of Rajasthan.

The majors also said a "holiday" for ONGC and Reliance from bidding would ensure that those firms concentrated on drilling their current blocks rather than seeking extensions due to equipment and labor limits.