Letters: No conflict

This refers to the July 13 letter written by Reliance ADAG Group President (Corporate Communications) Tony Jesudasan — Jesudasan was commenting upon an article written by Pradip Baijal, former chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).

The letter mentions that Pradip Baijal had been appointed chairman of the Pipeline Advisory Committee of the Petroleum & Natural Gas Regulatory Board

(PNGRB) and that notwithstanding the conflict of interest alleged in the said letter, he will oversee resolution of issues relating to the setting up of gas pipelines, the tariff regime, and issues related to city gas distribution (CGD). The factual position in this regard is that the Board decided to set up a Pipeline Advisory Committee with the following terms of reference:

To recommend the most suitable economic route taking into consideration broad geographical and environmental constraints.

 

To recommend optimum capacity keeping in view the medium and long-term supply projections of natural gas.

To recommend maximum consumer outreach which will include piped natural gas to CGD networks, CNG for transportation and natural gas for SME sector.

The role of the Committee is purely recommendatory and it doesn’t oversee issues related to even natural gas pipelines, let alone the tariff regime and CGD networks. Pradip Baijal was approached by the Board to chair the committee in view of his experience as the regulator of a major infrastructural sector. At the time of his appointment, he had orally and in writing on May 14, 2009 confirmed that there was no conflict of interest in his taking up the appointment since neither he nor Noesis Strategic Consultants had been consulted then by any petroleum, natural gas or pipeline company and would also not consult while preparing the report.

However, Pradip Baijal resigned from the chairmanship of the committee on June 24,2009, while reiterating his earlier confirmation of no conflict of interest, on the grounds that one of his partners ran three public relation companies which advise more than 100 corporates in India. PNGRB was not aware of and not concerned with the activities of the partner/s of Pradip Baijal. As per his request, the Board had accepted his resignation

Ratan P Watal, Secretary, PNGRB