A joint agreement/proposal has been submitted by Oil India and Engineers India for acquiring a stake in Bharat Petroleum Corporation in Numaligarh Refinery and the transaction is expected to be completed by March. As per the sources, both the companies submitted the bids on Feb 20 and price is of 48% stake in the company out of which 10% will be held by EIL.
Earlier Union Cabinet had cleared the proposal of strategic sale of the government’s share of 53.29% in BCPL on November 20, 2019 and which excluded Numaligarh Refinery setup in Assam’s Golaghat district after the provisions of the Assam Accord was signed on August 15, 1985.
The cost of the project is said to be Rs. 5500 crore. On Feb 18 OIL & EIL jointly announced that they will be submitting a joint bid to acquire a stake in NIL. The separation of NIL from BPCL is the first towards privatization of BPCL. Currently BCPL holds 61.65% & OIL holds 26% stake in NRL but if the deal goes through OIL’s stake will increase to 64%.