Speed of decision making not good for brand India: Robert Dudley, BP chief

He added that though there is a perception that India is challenged with oil and gas resources, it is blessed with a great market and whatever increased production will not be enough to fill it

Global oil and gas giant BP Plc on Monday urged India to make itself more competitive in framing contracts for exploration in the oil and gas sector in the country.

Critical about the pace of policy change, Group Chief Executive Robert Dudley said the speed of decision making was not good for Brand India and efforts to control retail pricing would not be beneficial for the sector in the long run.

He said his company and its partner, Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), which had committed $6 billion, would produce at least 10 per cent of India’s gas demand from the Krishna Godavari (KG) basin by 2022.

“BP is the only supermajor with a major commitment to the upstream segment in India,” he said, adding that India had taken steps like Hydrocarbon Exploration and Licensing Policy (HELP) and Discovered Field Rounds. However, he asked the country to be competitive like Brazil and Mexico in terms of upstream contracts. 

BP took over 30 per cent in multiple oil and gas blocks in India operated by RIL in 2011. In the KG-D6 block, RIL has a participating interest of 60 per cent, BP around 30 per cent, and the remaining 10 per cent is owned by Niko Resources. 

Since then, the two companies have invested around $2 billion in deep-water exploration and production. 

He said though there was a perception that India faced a challenge as far as oil and gas resources were concerned, it had a great market. 

Talking about rising international crude oil prices, he said there was no uncertainty about crude oil prices now.

Dudley's comment on controlled pricing comes days after the oil-marketing companies — Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPCL) — absorbed ~1 per litre each on prices of petrol and diesel early this month. 

He added the company's investment pace in India had been affected by gas pricing and once the Narendra Modi government came up with new gas pricing policy, that problem was sorted out. 

He indicated his company was not keen on further investment in the upstream sector in India for the ongoing round under Open Acreage Licensing Policy.