State gas utility GAIL India on Tuesday won rights to retail CNG and piped cooking gas in two of the six cities auctioned and is set to win for another two cities, while its joint venture with Hindustan Petroleum beat Reliance Industries to bag another city.
GAIL Gas Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of GAIL India, emerged as the top bidder to win the retailing rights for Kota in Rajasthan, Dewas in Madhya Pradesh, Meerut in Uttar Pradesh and Sonepat in Haryana when bids were opened by the sector regulator Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board on Tuesday.
"We opened bids for all the five cities and I can confirm to you that GAIL has been awarded two cities," PNGRB member B S Negi told PTI.
Only Kota and Dewas were awarded to GAIL on Tuesday and those for Meerut and Sonepat were withheld as Indraprastha Gas Ltd, the sole supplier of CNG in the national capital, had claimed rights over these two cities and challenged the auction in the appellate body.
Bhagyanagar Gas Ltd, an equal joint venture of GAIL and Hindustan Petroleum Corp, put in better bid than Reliance for the city gas project in Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh.
Negi said Meerut and Sonepat will be awarded later this week while for Mathura, the last date for bidding has been extended till April 1, after only one bid was received in the initial auction last month.
PNGRB had invited bids for six cities for city gas projects in first phase.
Eight companies including Reliance Industries, GAIL, Cairn and Indian Oil Corp had bid for the six cities for supplying compressed natural gas (CNG) to automobiles and piped natural gas to households for cooking purpose.
Reliance Gas Company, a subsidiary of RIL, put bid for just one city gas project at Kakinada. GAIL Gas had avoided bidding against Reliance and had bid for the other five cities and made competing bids against its joint ventures like Indraprastha Gas.
GAIL Gas beat the joint venture of Indian Oil Corp and Adani Energy and Cairn-Bharat Petroleum combine for Kota while for Dewas it had to trounce Gujarat State Petroleum Corp and IOC-Adani.
The joint venture of Indian Oil Corp and Adani Energy bid for Kota, Dewas, Meerut and Sonepat, while Cairn in a joint venture with Bharat Petroleum put in bids for Kota and Sonepat. GAIL Gas was the sole bidder for Mathura.
