Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance challenges court’s decision in favour of Modi govt, approaches SC for…

Reliance Industries has approached the SC against Delhi High court’s ruling which was in favour of the Indian government. There were allegations against Mukesh Ambani’s company of illegally extracting natural gas from the Krishna-Godavari (KG) Basin wells. 

The main questions was whether gas from ONGC’s fields moved to RIL’s KG-D6 block and if ONGC’s gas reserves depleted due to RIL’s operations or not. The Delhi HC earlier gave a decision against Reliance and supported the government’s claims.

The dispute started in 2013 when ONGC (Oil and Natural Gas Corporation) accused Reliance of unfairly working in gas reserves from its blocks. The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas alleged that Reliance extracted gas from ONGC’s wells.

The government demanded compensation of $1.6 billion and $175 million as additional ‘profit petroleum’ owned by Reliance. In February 2023, the Delhi HC overturned the arbitration decision and favored the government.

The High Court stated that Reliance got unfair advantage by extracting gas from ONGC’s blocks. A bench of Justice Rekha Palli and Justice Saurabh Banerjee voided both the tribunal’s decision and order a prior to 2021.

On May 14, 2024, Reliance filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging the High Court’s decision. Foreign partners in the KG-D6 consortium like BP Exploration (Alpha) and Canada’s Niko Resources Ltd, also submitted separate appeals.

News