In a major development, Assam Chief Minister Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday said that the government will raise its stake in NRL by 18.59 percent. The state will now acquire 26 per cent stakes in the public sector enterprise.
Earlier, the Assam government had a stake of 12.35 percent in Numaligarh Refinery Limited. The Chief Minister also stated that another 7.41 per cent of stakes will be acquired in the future, during a press meet.
Consolidating the percentage of stakes, the government has made a total investment of Rs. 2,187 crores in NRL, the highest ever investment in any PSU by the Government of Assam, Dr. Sarma claimed.
Numaligarh Refinery was set up as per Clause 7 of the Assam Accord in 1985. The refinery was commissioned in the year 2000 and was a subsidiary of Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL).
As per the Centre's directive BPCL will be privatise, and in order to retain its public sector enterprise status, the state government took the initiative to invest with a large percentage of share and henceforth Numaligarh Refinery will remain a standalone refinery.
NRL has a production capacity of 3 Million MT, and it has received approval of increasing its capacity to 9 MMT by 2024 from the Government of India, Dr. Sarma said.
The minister also said the restructuring the equity stake, 61.65 per cent share owned by BPCL will be sold to Oil India Limited (OIL), Government of Assam, and Engineers India (EIL).
Moreover, in order to enhance the crude oil capacity of the state, Dr. Sarma informed that crude pipeline from Paradeep in Odisha will be imported which will substantially raise the capacity of NRL, Bongaigaon and Guwahati refinery.
Earlier, crude oil was sent to Barauni, but now 6 MT crude will be imported to the state.
