More MPs want RIL gas fields nationalised

The Ambani gas dispute continues to agitate Members of Parliament, with some raising the demand for nationalisation of Reliance Industries' eastern offshore KG-D6 fields.

Lok Sabha MP Harsh Vardhan on July 23 wrote to Petroleum Minister Murli Deora asking why the government had kept quiet for all this while on the Ambani family MoU that provides for dividing Krishna-Godavari basin gas between companies run by brothers Mukesh and Anil.

"If RIL has indeed violated the Production Sharing Contract and has kept the Petroleum Ministry and the Government of India - the real owner of this KG basin gas - out of the loop (on signing of MoU), then by merely penalising RIL with a mere penalty of few lakhs rupees will not serve the purpose," he wrote.

"The Government of India should nationalise all assets of KG basin and give RIL an assured return on its investment."

Rajya Sabha member Alka Balram Kshatriya stated that the private family MoU "touches upon the government's supreme and sovereign right on country's natural resource like gas and the government's plenary power to regulate its allocation as well as pricing."

"On the face of it the private arrangement mitigates against public commitment under PSC," she wrote. "In the circumstances, the government should uphold, defend and vindicate its policies by pro-active intervention in the Supreme Court."