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Gas, crude oil output to be hiked in NE

By SPL CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI, March 16 � Admitting that crude oil and gas production in the North-east has declined, Union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that they are working on a plan to increase production in the region.

Replying to question in the Lok Sabha during a Question Hour discussion, the Minister cited law-and-order problems, infrastructure and technical issues for the declining oil and gas production.

Stating that the north-eastern region has a huge reserve of oil and gas, the Union Minister said the level of exploration that should have taken place during the last 50-60 years, has not been undertaken. �We are working on a plan to increase exploration activity in the North-east,� Pradhan said.

The Minister further said that 40 per cent subsidy on supply of gas in the north-eastern region is available to all operators to incentivise exploration and production.

In reply to a separate question, the Minister while claiming that a small quantity of associated natural gas is flared, said that the Oil India Limited on an average is flaring 0.44 MMSCMD of gas, which amounts to 5.8 per cent of the total production.

Earlier, Sushmita Dev said her constituency in Cachar and the neighbouring constituency of Karimganj are floating on oil and natural gas according to a geologist Pradeep Kumar Nandi. In this part of Assam, exploration has not been done properly by the ONGC due to lack of technology, she said.

It may be mentioned that the flaring of natural gas in the oil fields of Assam has drawn flak as it is seen as a wastage of the precious resource.

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