Manish Maheshwari new CEO of Essar oil's E&P business

With about 23 years' experience, he was till recently MD of Hindustan Oil Exploration Co

Essar Oil Ltd today announced the appointment of Manish Maheshwari as Chief Executive Officer of its oil and gas Exploration and Production (E&P) business.

As CEO-E&P, he would be responsible for Essar's entire E&P business, which includes 15 blocks and fields in various stages of exploration and production in India, Indonesia, Madagascar, Nigeria and Vietnam, the company said in a statement here.

With around 23 years of experience, Maheshwari till recently was the Managing Director of Hindustan Oil Exploration Company Ltd, it said.

The total reserves and resources across these assets is estimated at 2,034 million barrels of oil and oil equivalent gas.

Essar's development and production assets include the Raniganj CBM Block in West Bengal, Ratna & R Series oil and gas fields in Mumbai Offshore, and the Mehsana Block in Gujarat.

At Raniganj, the current gas production is about 300,000 standard cubic metres per day (scmd), which shall ramp up to 3 million scmd, the statement said.

"The company has drilled 230 wells and laid requisite infrastructure including pipelines to supply CBM Gas to end consumers," it added.

At HOEC, Maheshwari led the initiative to induct strategic partners in the company and positioning the company on a multifold increase in production.

He previously served as Investment Manager in a Danish Investment Fund where he developed strategy for investments in East European countries aligned to promoting Scandinavian companies interest.

Before moving to Denmark, Maheshwari, who holds degree a bachelors degress in chemical mngineering and Masters in Business Administration from Strathclyde University, UK, spent about 12 years with companies like Tata Industries and Hindustan Unilever.

Besides the exploration portfolio, Essar Oil also owns India's second largest single site refinery having a capacity of 20 million tonnes per annum at Vadinar in Gujarat. It also has more than 1,700 petrol pumps across the country.