India will import five additional cargoes of LPG in November to meet the shortfall in domestic cooking gas created due to the unplanned shutdown of a crucial unit of Reliance Industries Ltd's Jamnagar refinery.

The state-run Indian Oil Corporation will import 65,000 tonnes of LPG in November to bridge the shortfall arising out of the shutdown of fluidised catalytic cracking unit (FCCU) of the country's largest LPG producer, sources said in New Delhi.

Reliance had on October 20 shut down a FCCU of its 31 million tonnes Jamnagar refinery for two weeks following a leak.

"The 65,000 tonnes of imports would be over and above the 2 cargoes a month IOC plans to import during November-January to meet the additional winter season demand," they said, adding the company has already tied up the winter season imports with Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

"Now, the company is again in the market for five additional cargoes," they said.

The Jamnagar refinery accounts for about one-quarter of India's total refining capacity of 117 million tonnes. The company, which does not have a retail network of its own, sells 13.1 million tonnes of petroleum products annually to state-run marketing firms - IOC, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd.

Of this, IOC picks about 7.5 million tonnes while the remaining is equally shared between HPCL and BPCL.

Reliance sells about 230,000 tonnes of LPG every month to the state-run firms for sale through their network.