Govt seeks $30 bn from Reliance, BP in KG-D6 gas field dispute
image for illustrative purpose
New Delhi: The government is seeking over $30 billion from Reliance Industries Ltd and BP as compensation, alleging the partners built larger-than-required facilities at the KG-D6 fields and subsequently failed to meet natural gas output targets, sources said.
The government made the claim during its submissions before a three-member ar-bitration tribunal that on November 7 concluded hearings on the 14-year-old dis-pute. The tribunal is expected to give its award sometime next year and the party that loses will most likely challenge it before the Supreme Court, three sources aware of the matter said.
Reliance and BP did not immediately offer any comments on the issue.
Sources said the government in the arbitration proceedings sought monetary value of the natural gas that wasn’t produced as well as a compensation for excess amount spent on installations, fuel marketing, and interest.
It put the value for all of this at over $30 billion.
The dispute stems from alleged failure of Reliance to comply with approved in-vestment plan that led to under-utilisation of capacity at the Dhirubhai-1 and 3 fields - the first and the largest of discoveries in the Krishna Godavari basin KG-DWN-98/3 (KG-D6) block to be put on production.
