India, the world's third-biggest oil importer and consumer, wants to unlock its hydrocarbon reserves to cut dependence on costly imports. India imports over 80% of its oil needs.
State refiners in Asia's third-largest economy are also expanding their refining and fuel retailing capacities to meet the country's growing fuel demand.
Nearly half of overall expenditure would be for refineries expansion and upgrade while about 44% will be used for exploration and production of hydrocarbons, the data provided in the budget documents shows.
The federal government would also provide 300 billion rupees in support to oil refiners and marketing companies for projects aimed at cutting emissions.
Below is the table of state-run oil companies' planned expenditure in billion rupees in the fiscal year to March 31, 2024.
Companies FY24 Budgeted %Chg over
Capex FY23
Exploration and
Production
Oil and Natural Gas Corp Ltd 301.3 0.6
GAIL (India) Ltd 60.0 -9.6
Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd 23.6 7.3
Indian Oil Corp Ltd 1.4 189.5
Oil India Ltd 49.0 11.6
ONGC Videsh Ltd 32.3 11.1
TOTAL 467.6 1.3
Refinary and
Marketing Sector
Indian Oil Corp Ltd 257.4 83.1
Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd 102.1 42.5
Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd 71.4 87.9
Chennai Petroleum Corp Ltd 5.5 -6.2
Numaligarh Refinery Ltd 82.9 17.7
Mangalore Refineries and 8.2 0.6
Petrochemicals Ltd
TOTAL 527.5 57.6
Petrochemical
Sector
Indian Oil Corp Ltd 45.1 49.4
GAIL (India) Ltd 17.5 37.1
Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd 5.0 --
TOTAL 67.6 57.4
0.0
Engineering Sector
Balmer Lawrie and Co Ltd 0.4 0.0
Engineers India Ltd 1.0 40.0
TOTAL 24.5 1.4
Capital Support to Oil Marketing 300.0 --
Companies
Source: Budget document
($1 = 81.8830 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by Nidhi Verma; Editing by Bernadette Baum)
