‘Sued RIL to protect commercial interests,’ asserts ONGC CMD

ONGC said on Tuesday that its move to sue Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) for alleged natural gas ‘theft’ from its Bay of Bengal block, was to protect its “commercial interest”.  ‘The matter (of RIL allegedly drawing gas from ONGC blocks) was brought to the notice of our board (in March). The board was of the view that we need to protect our commercial interest at all costs. If that requires any legal recourse, we will take that,’ ONGC CMD Dinesh K Sarraf told reporters here.

ONGC wants a ‘truly independent’ agency to examine the matter, and seeks compensation from RIL if it is established that the private firm drew gas from its reservoir. The company believes its Godavari Block (known as G-4) and New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP-1) discovery block KG-DWN-98/2 are contiguous to RIL-operated NELP-1 Block KG-DWN-98/3 (KG-D6). It feels the KT-1/D-1 gas find in block KG-DWN-98/2 and G-4 Pliocene gas find in Godavari Block extend outside the block boundaries into KG-D6.

‘As per our data, some of the resources are common to our block and RIL. There is apprehension that some wells (of RIL) on the boundary of the block may be drawing gas from our fields,’ he said. ONGC believes that RIL’s D6-A5, D6-A9 and D6-A13 wells drilled close to the block boundary may be draining gas from G-4 field of Godavari block while the well D6-B8 may be draining gas from DWN-D-1 field of KG-DWN-98/2 block.