Reliance Industries, the largest private sector oil refining company in the country, plans to set up seven wholesale oil terminals across the country. These terminals will be unveiled sometime in the second half of March.

Speaking on the sidelines of the roadshows for the divestment of the government's 24 stake in IPCL in Mumbai, Mukesh Ambani, chairman and managing director of Reliance Industries, said the company will enter into retail distribution of transportation fuel. "We have already opened 4 retail outlets for training purposes," he said.

He said the company will set up 350 retail outlets by March 2004 and this would go up to 500 by June 2004. The total retail outlets where Reliance will sell transportation fuels will touch 1,500 by end of 2005.

Reliance has already received nod from the government to set up 5,840 retail outlets. On whether Reliance has sought a two-year extension of its marketing pact with public sector companies, Ambani said the company has only discussed selling LPG to national oil companies. "There were no talks of any extension for marketing fuels by oil PSUs," he added.

Reliance markets transportation fuel from its 33 million tonne refinery at Jamnagar, Gujarat, through the Indian Oil Corporation, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation and Bharat Petroleum Corporation.

This agreement expires on March 31, 2004. Sources said the state oil refiners are planning to curtail purchases from Reliance's refinery as they have already lined up capacity increases through de-bottlenecking.