India's Petroleum Ministry on Tuesday (December 19) said no timeline has been determined so far for the potential merger between Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL).
The merger of the two oil giants will require careful and detailed assessment, the government informed the Parliament during the ongoing winter session.
The central government has been mulling over the merger for quite some time now. Back in 2022, a committee of experts was set up to review the integration and synergies of entities of Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), including MRPL and HPCL. The decision of the merger came after ONGC acquired HPCL five years ago.
The move will help ONGC — a public sector undertaking under the ownership of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas — to streamline its downstream vertical. In addition to this, the merger is expected to boost the refining capacity of HPCL.
The union government has been for a long aiming to create larger, more efficient, and more competitive entities in the Indian oil sector.
Earlier this year, ONGC chairman Arun Kumar Singh had hinted that the company would start working on the process soon. As per an Economic Times report, the ministry is working on the merger which will mainly be a share-swap deal.
Many media reports and experts in the sector have said it would take longer for ONGC to complete the merger, owing to the long documentation and approval process.
