BP gets Centre's approval to retail petrol, diesel

Earlier, co got full approval to sell ATF

BP, Europe’s third-biggest oil company, has received government approval to set up petrol pumps to retail petrol and diesel in India.

BP will be the tenth player to enter the lucrative fuel retailing business that is seeing double digit growth, not seen anywhere in the world.

The UK-based firm, as also Haldia Petrochemicals, was given approval by the Oil Ministry to retail petrol and diesel just a few days back, sources said.

When contacted, a BP India spokesperson said: “BP sees a strong future for transportation fuels in India. We are keen to be involved in this market and contribute to its development.”

The company had in January this year won in-principle approval to retail aviation turbine fuel (ATF) to airlines in India. A few months later, it got full approval for that.

Now, the company has also got permission for retailing petrol and diesel.

“We can confirm we have been granted approval for marketing for ATF and have additionally applied for an authorisation to market MS (petrol) and HSD (diesel),” the BP spokesperson said.

For a licence to retail auto fuels petrol, diesel and ATF, a company should have invested a minimum of Rs 2,000 crore in exploration or production of oil and gas, oil refining, gas or product pipeline or terminals leading to additionality to the existing assets or creation of new assets in the eligible activities.

BP, which had in 2011 bought 30% interest in 21 exploration blocks of Reliance Industries for $7.2 billion, had cited investment of nearly $500 million in oil and gas exploration and production for gaining the licence.

India currently has about 56,190 petrol pumps, with public sector firms operating a majority of them.

Private sector operators are limited to Essar Oil and Reliance Industries, which between them have some 3,500 petrol pumps. Royal Dutch Shell operates 82 petrol stations. Numaligarh Refineries (NRL) and Mangalore Refineries and Petrochemicals (MRPL) are late entrants and have six outlets between them.

State-owned Indian Oil Corp (IOC) owns 25,363 petrol pumps, Hindustan Petroleum Corp (HPCL) 13,802 stations and Bharat Petroleum Corp (BPCL) 13,439 outlets. Haldia Petrochemicals (HPL) was the latest company to get fuel retailing rights and BP now is the tenth player in the arena.