As per the oil and gas exploration blocks offered in the latest auction, state-owned Oil India Ltd. (OIL) gets 12, Vedanta Ltd. gets 10 and Oil and Natural Gas Corp. (ONGC) bags eight. According to the list of winners of Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) Round II and III put out by the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH), Reliance Industries (RIL) and its British partner BP won a Krishna Godavari (KG) basin gas block. Indian Oil Corp (IOC) also got one block. RIL-BP combine outbid ONGC in one KG basin block in the Bay of Bengal. This is an area that ONGC had previously relinquished and is said to hold natural gas prospects.
According to DGH, OIL won 6 out of the 14 blocks on offer in OALP-II, while Vedanta walked away with five. ONGC, Reliance-BP and IOC won one block each. In OALP-III, ONGC won 7 blocks while OIL got 6 and Vedanta the remaining five.
Bidding for 14 blocks on offer in the OALP round-II and another 18 oil and gas blocks and 5 coal-bed methane (CBM) blocks on offer in OALP-III closed on May 15. No bid was received for any of the CBM blocks. RIL-BP had made their first bid in eight years when they sought an area that previously was held by ONGC, sources said.
OIL gets 12, Vedanta Ltd. 10 and ONGC 8 in oil and gas exploration blocks offered in latest auction
