India is trying to wear the dragon mask. It has started matching the Chinese aggression on bidding for oil and gas fields abroad.
After losing out to China in Angola and Indonesia, the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation does not want to lose the Yukos game in Russia.
The domestic oil major wants to spice up its 15 per cent equity offer for Yuganskneftegas, the main production unit of Yukos, with a loan offer of $3-4 billion.
The offer is aimed at matching China's decision to lend $6 billion to Rosneft, which needs $9.4 billion to buy the production unit from Russia.
Yuganskneftegas, which pumps 1 million barrels per day of crude, was nationalised by the Russian government after its owner Yukos was slapped with over $27 billion in tax arrears. The government awarded the bid for Yuganskneftgas to Rosneft's front company Baikal Finance.
By giving the loans against future supplies, China wants to end the uncertainty over oil supplies from Yukos, which was selling it 7 million tonnes.
India has no such compulsion and will prefer equity participation as that ensures a bigger share in the event of more reserves being discovered, said an official. But the Chinese loan offer has led to some rethinking on the issue.
"China has been beating us in the bidding game since it takes bigger risks but in our case the risks are decided by the Cabinet," said an official.
