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Plan mooted to break impasse over oil PSUs sale

In a bid to break the impasse over divestment in public sector oil units, the concerned ministries are examining a possibility to allow ONGC and GAIL (Gas Authority of India Ltd) as junior partners of international player to bid for HPCL and BPCL.

This could, perhaps, be a backdoor method to enable the government to have a say in the running of Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd through its stake directly and state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, sources indicated.

As part of this move ONGC could join Petronas of Malaysia as a junior partner to bid jointly for HPCL and BPCL, sources said.

An informal idea has been placed before the ministries of petroleum and divestment to break the logjam following stiff opposition from Petroleum Minister Ram Naik, Defence Minister George Fernandes and others to any move for sale of government equity in oil PSUs to a strategic partner.

As such, Cabinet Committee on Divestment at its last meeting had decided that per se any public sector unit would not be allowed to bid for any state owned undertaking but exception could be made in case the administrative ministry in charge of such public sector units made out a case for it.

Following the Cabinet Committee on Divestment meet on September 7, Divestment Minister Arun Shourie had said in case of a request for allowing a public sector unit to bid, the issue would be examined by Cabinet Committee on Divestment.

Sources said the proposal was first mooted at the CCD last month.

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