Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL) continues to source crude from Iran and there are no bottlenecks to regular supply, the company's Chairman Mr A.K. Hazarika said.

Addressing a post-AGM (annual general meeting) press conference in Mangalore on Saturday, Mr Hazarika said MRPL was importing about 65 per cent of its crude from Iran.

“Today, we have a very good relationship with Iran. With good corporate governance, we tried our best to pay their dues. Ultimately, we found a solution to the problem and started paying. So, crude oil has also started coming from Iran without any stoppage,” he said.

Other tie-up

As an alternative arrangement, MRPL has tied up with other crude oil suppliers, with the latest deal being a deal with Kuwait, he said.

Mr P.P. Upadhya, Director (Technical) of MRPL, said MRPL was sourcing around seven million tonnes from Iran. “We added Kuwait recently, and we will be taking about one million tonnes (of crude) this year,” he said.

Asked about the future payment mechanism, Mr Hazarika said: “We have some alternative mechanisms for payment. I cannot disclose that now.”

The RBI recently discontinued the Asian Clearing Union mechanism for effecting remittances (in lieu of crude oil supplied) to Iran. This had temporarily scuttled the process of payments to the West Asian nation. Mr Hazarika said this had, however, not stopped crude oil deliveries from Iran.

Expansion project

Asked about the third phase expansion project of MRPL, Mr U.K. Basu, Managing Director of MRPL, said the total value of orders placed on July 15 was Rs 10,194 crore. .

Project implementation is progressing at a steady pace and it was likely to comply with the targeted commissioning schedule (in January 2012), he said. The project would also be eligible for tax benefits if it is commissioned before March 2012.

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