More companies to come to India for Oil and Gas exploration:Secy

New Delhi, May 22 (UNI) The government today said, more and more companies are willing to come to India to join the largely unexplored sector of drilling for gas and oil after clear policies were formulated and added that it was taking steps to encourage this.

''More and more companies are willing to come to India to join the largely unexplored sector of drilling for gas and oil after clear policies had been formulated as was evident from NELP V'' Ministry of Petroleum Joint Secretary Sunjoy Joshi said at the inauguration of NELP-VI - CBM III interactive meet on 'Building partnerships for upstream Oil and Gas' organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), here today.

Director General Hydrocarbons, V K Sibal stated that the Government was taking a number of steps to encourage participants from all over the world to come to India to explore the possibility of oil and gas in the country.

He asserted that there was minimum interference from the Government in the biding process and all the deals, terms and onditions and regulations were totally transparent and available on the net so that no one feels discriminated.

''We have laid down clear cut guidelines and firm policies creating a friendly and open atmosphere to fulfill the expectation of the investors and there is no delay in the clearance of the files. In the case of States we even talk to the officials of the State where needed. This is a remarkable achievement for a business that was started only four years ago,'' he stated.

Mr Joshi stressed that most of the sedimentary basins in the country remained unexplored even though oil exploration had started in India 100 years ago. However in 1999 a new perspective on what could be done to remedy this situation was formulated which had changed the situation considerably.

Mentioning doubts among investors about partnerships he said, ''The Government neither encourages nor discourages partnerships and the parties who are willing to go into such partnerships should take the decision on their own''.

''After NELP V we had a series of brain storming sessions leading to a much more rational policy through a new process of consultation. The process has not ended and we still welcome suggestions and feedback,'' he stated.

Mr Sibal said that there was a problem of availability of rigs and others equipments for drilling in the country but this was a problem all over the world. He announced that the Government was thinking of setting up Special Economics Zones (SEZ) for manufacturing these equipments in the country.

He invited investors to come to India as there were tremendous opportunities in this field which had been largely unexplored so far and pointed out that the existing players who had taken their chance four years ago had reaped a rich harvest and made huge profits.

UNI ARB MP KN1820