Oil’s well: PM to lay Barmer refinery foundation in Dec

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will lay the foundation stone of Barmer Refinery-cum-Petrochemical complex in December, Union minister for petroleum and natural gas, and skill development and entrepreneurship Dharmendra Pradhan informed the media while visiting Bharatiya Skill Development University (BSDU) on Friday.

“The refinery project has got environment clearance. We have sought time from the Prime Minister and most likely its foundation will be laid by him next month,” Pradhan said, claiming that India is moving fast in the direction of skill development and Modi himself monitors the schemes under it.

The Raje government is in war-footing mode to launch the project at the earliest. The reason is previous Gehlot government, which claims the refinery its brainchild, had signed an MoU with HPCL (Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited) before the Assembly elections in 2013 but failed to turn into reality.

When Raje came into power, she said that state needed to renegotiate the project. After almost three years of negotiations, the state government signed a new MoU with HPCL in April this year for setting up the complex.

As per the agreement, the HPCL has a 74 per cent stake while the state government holds a 26 per cent stake in the new firm …read more