RIL may have to share oil PSUs' losses

Reliance Industries may be asked to shell out about Rs 700 crore to offset losses incurred by public sector oil companies on account of selling petrol, diesel, kerosene and cooking gas below cost price.
The private sector firm is the latest addition to an ad-hoc plan to distribute the Rs 9,500 crore revenue loss to Indian Oil Corp, Hindustan Petroleum, Bharat Petroleum and IBP, suffered as a result of the government decision disallowing a price hike in step with the rise in raw material costs.

Oil ministry officials said Oil and Natural Gas Corporation may pick up about Rs 3,500 crore of the loss, while standalone refiners -- Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals, Chennai Petroleum and Kochi Refineries -- may have to bear around Rs 700 crore. GAIL and Oil India Ltd may bear around Rs 400 crore of the under-recovery.
"Without the sharing scheme, IOC would have reported a net loss of Rs 1,800 crore, BPCL Rs 1,300 crore, HPCL Rs 1,050 crore and IBP Rs 400 crore," a top ministry official said.

The ministry plans to make ONGC, which has gained most from spurt in global crude oil prices as its realisation on domestic crude oil has shot up in tandem, to pick up 90 % of the over Rs 4,000 crore net loss of the retailing firms.
Till last year, ONGC, GAIL and OIL shared one-third of under-realisation on LPG and kerosene by way of giving discounts to retailing firms.