The Union Cabinet of India has approved a proposal to conduct the second round of auctions under the discovered small field (DSF) policy for 60 oil and gas sites.
Approval leads the way for the bidding of 60 discovered small fields or unmonetised discoveries.
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Of the proposed fields to be allocated to companies who place winning bids, 22 fields or discoveries belong to Oil and Natural Gas (ONGC), with five held by Oil India (OIL).
The bidding round will also include 12 relinquished fields or discoveries from the new exploration and licensing policy (NELP) blocks.
Furthermore, the auctions will also feature 21 fields or discoveries, which were put up for sale in DSF Bid Round-l, and were not awarded after the investor failed to provide confirmation for the purchase.
Based on official estimates, the discoveries are expected to have estimated oil and equivalent gas in place of 194.65 million metric tonnes.
Through the auction of the fields, the government intends to enhance the country’s energy security.
The government is anticipating the creation of direct and indirect jobs amounting to 88,000 through investments in the fields.
Contracts will be approved by the Indian Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas and Minister of Finance.
In a separate move, ONGC is planning to offload its holding in two state-run energy companies, Indian Oil and GAIL India, in order to repay debt raised for the Rs369.15bn ($5.7bn) acquisition of a 51% stake in Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL), according to Bloomberg.
