THE government put on a brave face on the tepid response to 70 oil

RELATED ARTICLES Essar's Ravi Ruia, Loop executives get bail in 2G case RIL selects Phillips 66 technology for Jamnagar plants Govt patronises RIL, alleges CPI-M Cairn deal boosts miner Vedanta's core profit Gas from KG-D6 drops to about 32 mmscmd

blocks offered under new exploration licensing policy-VIII and 10 gas blocks offered under coal bed methane IV.

“Globally, bidding has been affected by the economic slowdown and companies facing credit crunch… We have received 76 bids for 36 blocks under Nelp-VIII and 26 bids for 8 blocks under CBM-IV,” oil secretary R S Pandey said on Monday.

A total of 62 companies -- 10 foreign and 52 Indian – have bid either on their own or as part of a consortium.

ONGC has bid for the most number of blocks. Reliance Industries did not bid for any oil block but made a symbolic bid for one CBM block. RIL had bagged 45 blocks in during Nelp-VII.

Director general of hydrocarbons, V K Sibal said, “The government’s desire to enhance the number of players in E&P sector has been achieved as is evident from the fact that 36 new companies have given bids either on their own or in consortium. In respect of 8 deep-water blocks, single bids were received from ONGC (6 blocks), BG consortium (1 block) and Cairn Energy India consortium (1 block).”

The petroleum and natural gas ministry tried to play down the poor response by citing subdued bidding in countries like Algeria, Uruguay, Indonesia, Brazil, Norway, Iceland and Iran.

Response to Nelp-VIII is second only to Norway, Pandey said.

Barring Norway, no other country received even 50 per cent response.

The fact that three new foreign companies and 10 new domestic companies have bid for the blocks shows that the country’s prospectivity is high, he added.

Responding to Anil Ambani group’s statement that oil ministry's interference in marketing and pricing has dampened investor interest in Nelp-VIII, Pandey said, “The fact remains that there has been no change in marketing and pricing freedom for Nelp-VII and VIII… nothing has been changed in the contract document.”

On October 9, Anil Ambani had written to prime minister Manmohan Singh saying that “petroleum ministry's open interference by curtailing marketing and pricing freedom is the single biggest reason for lack of international investor interest’’.

Sibal said that “abusing” of product sharing contract (by one corporate group) is one of the important factors for the not-so-good response to the bidding.