Oman Oil Company Ltd is keen to raise its stake in the proposed 6 million tonne refinery of public sector Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd.
NEW DELHI: Oman Oil Company Ltd is keen to raise its stake in the proposed 6 million tonne refinery of public sector Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd.
Oman’s commerce and industry minister Maqbool Ali Sultan, on a visit to India, would be holding discussion in this regard with BPCL chairman and managing director Ashok Sinha on Wednesday.
“We will be discussing various issues including a possibility of increasing our stake,” Sultan, also chairman of Oman Oil, said on Monday.
BPCL has formed Bharat Oman Refineries Ltd, a joint venture with Oman Oil, to set up Rs 5,000-crore refinery in Bina in Madhya Pradesh by December 2009.
Oman Oil currently holds just 3% stake in the joint venture though when the refinery was conceived some 10 years back the company was conceived to be a major partner in the refinery.
Sources indicated that the Indian government was also in discussions with Oman for accessing 0.6 to 1.5 million tonne LNG for the Dabhol power plant in Maharashtra.
On being asked whether Oman had put behind its Dabhol experience and was willing to have a gas tie-up with India, Sultan told DNA Money, “We don’t see any problems. Discussions are going on for sorting out the issues.”
Oman was a the supplier of liquefied natural gas for the erstwhile Dabhol Power Company but the contracted supplies could never start since payment problems saw closing down of the power plant in 2001. This had created reservations in Oman on future supplies. Sultan said Oman was willing to supply LNG but its 9 million tonne LNG capacity was tied up with countries such as Korea, Japan and Spain.
Sultan said there was immense potential for cooperation between Indian and Oman companies in the fields of information technology, tourism and human resources development and training and knowledge based industries such as IT, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology.
Oman is keen to develop a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with India. The proposed FTA will come up for discussion with Indian Minister for Commerce Kamal Nath at meeting on September 5.
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