"The board of GAIL gave the go-ahead for further time-bound action and finalization of the project execution plans," a company statement said Wednesday.

Depending on the source and customer tie-up, the 30-inch, 730-kilometer pipeline will be designed to carry 16 million standard cubic meters per day of gas, the company said.

"The project shall be appraised or upgraded in respect of investment, customer's identification, routing of the pipeline and freezing the design parameters before final investment approval by the GAIL Board," the statement said.

The Dabhol-Bangalore pipeline will pass through Ratnagiri and Kolhapur in Maharashtra and Belgaum, Dharwad, Haveri, Davangere, Chitradurga, Tumkur in Karnataka, it said.

With this pipeline, natural gas from RGPPL's LNG Terminal could be supplied to industrial clusters in the states of Maharashtra and Karnataka, GAIL said.

"The Dabhol-Bangalore pipeline is among the five new pipelines for which GAIL has already received authorization in the first quarter of 2007," the company said.