India to auction 60 oil blocks in May

NEW DELHI, April 18 (UPI) -- India said it plans to auction 60 oil and gas blocks under the seventh round of the new exploration licensing policy in May.

Directorate General of Hydrocarbons V.K. Sibal said, however, he was not in a position to announce an open acreage bidding system, as data collection was ongoing.

The previous NELP round saw the auction of 55 blocks.

"The DGH is hoping NELP-VII to be opened within a month or two," Sibal said. "We had little information to offer on the sedimentation in the basin during the last round held last year."

He was referring to the Kerala-Konkan basin.

Sibal said DGH had the relevance information on the Kerala-Konkan basin and was expecting it to attract investment.

Refusing to share details, Sibal said the ratio of on-land blocks may go up in NELP-VII. He said a number of onshore blocks in Maharashtra, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab, Bihar and west Bengal states could be offered for auction.

The DGH also has plans to auction a large number of deep-water blocks; the number of offshore blocs may remain unchanged, The Business Line newspaper reported Wednesday.

In NELP-VI India auctioned 30 offshore, including 24 deep-water, blocks. Sibal said in the offshore, large blocks would be auctioned for exploration in Kerala-Konkan, Kutch-Saurashtra and Laxmi basins.