The Government is looking into State-owned Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd’s (BPCL) investments in a gas block in Mozambique and has not yet formally given its approval to the firm for further spendings, sources said. Bharat PetroResources Ltd (BPRL), an exploration and production subsidiary of BPCL, had in August 2008 bought a 10 per cent stake in Area-1 Offshore of the Rovuma Block from the US energy major Anadarko Petroleum Corp for $75 million. That same month Videocon through its subsidiary acquired a 10 per cent stake in the same block for an equivalent block.

Sources privy to the development said Anadarko had originally offered a 20 per cent stake in Area-1 to BPCL but the state-owned firm bought only half of it and the rest was picked up by Videocon.

Videocon in 2013 sold the same stake to ONGC Videsh Ltd for $2.475 billion.

Sources said the government is looking into reasons why BPCL did not buy the entire 20 per cent stake offered to it by Anadarko. Also, why it did not get other state-owned firms like ONGC involved if it wanted the exploration risk to be shared by splitting the 20 per cent stake. These inquests have led to the government not formally according approval to BPCL to invest a further $2.2-2.4 billion in the development of a giant gas field discovered in Area-1.

The proposal was reviewed by an informal ministerial panel headed by Home Minister Amit Shah in June this year. The BJP-led NDA Government since first coming to power in 2014 has been critical of the nearly $6 billion spent by the Indian public sector firms to take 30 per cent stake in the Rovuma Offshore Area-1 in Mozambique during the Congress-led UPA regime.