'Indian Oil & BPCL Keen to Acquire GAIL

Cabinet Minister for Oil & Gas Ministry, Mr. Dharmendra Pradhan said Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and BPCL both keen to acquire gas utility GAIL, which as per the extant policy needs to be split by separating gas transportation business from its marketing unit.

IOC and BPCL have separately indicated to the petroleum ministry their interest in taking over GAIL to add natural gas to their oil refining and marketing business.

In a written reply to a question in Rajya Sabha, Pradhan said Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in the 2017-18 Budget unveiled government's plan to create integrated public sector oil majors "through consolidation, mergers and acquisitions" so as that the merged company has "capacity to bear higher risks, avail economies of scale, take higher investment decisions" and is "able to match the performance of international and domestic private companies.

"Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOCL) and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) had written to the Ministry for integration with GAIL (India) Limited. However, government has not taken any decision in this regard," Pradhan said.