Natural gas pricing for PSUs artificially low:Planning Comm

The Planning Commission says that the natural gas pricing for the public sector undertakings (PSUs) is artificially very low. It needs to be brought in alignment with the price being determined by the Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM), which have arrived at USD 4.2 per mmbtu. CNBC-TV18's Nayantara Rai reports. Here is a verbatim transcript of Nayantara Rai’s comments on CNBC-TV18. Also watch the accompanying video. The planning commission has endorsed the USD 4.2/mmbtu. The natural gas pricing for public sector undertaking is artificially very low and it needs to be brought in alignment with the price being determined by the empowered group of ministers (EGoM), which have arrived at this USD 4.2/mmbtu, so they are endorsing this view. What is also important its not that the planning commission is saying this but it has recommended this in the full planning commission meet which is attended by the Prime Minister, the Finance Minister, the Power Minister, Railways Minister, etc, this is the important development that the planning commission has recommended this move, it is a part of the integrated energy policy. Some other salient points which are also mentioned in this integrated energy policy such as the regulatory regime and the upstream and downstream needs a major overhaul and that is something which we are hearing a lot about and acquisition of oil assets including those by ONGC Videsh are still inadequate.