Anil Ambani calls on Manmohan

Billionaire Anil Ambani today called on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for close to an hour but refused to comment on the purpose of his meeting.

The meeting comes within days of the Supreme Court rejecting his group firm, RNRL’s plea for cheap gas from Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) in line with a private family agreement of 2005.

The Reliance-Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group chairman, who earlier in the day had an hour-long meeting with the prime minister’s principle secretary, T K A Nair, did not take questions from media on the purpose of the visit.

The apex court had on May 7 ruled that the government is the owner of all gas until delivery to the consumers and had the right to fix its price and users.

Reliance Natural Resources Limited (RNRL) was seeking supply of 28 million cubic meters per day of gas for 17 years at a price of $2.34 per million British thermal unit(mBtu) for the group’s proposed power plant at Dadri, as opposed to the government-approved price of $4.2 per mBtu.

According to the Supreme Court verdict, RNRL can only get gas in future based on government allocation and pricing. While the court asked RIL and RNRL to renegotiate the gas supply master agreement (GSMA) in six weeks, the provisions of any such agreement are to be in line with the Production Sharing Contract and the ambit of government policy.