Prime Minister dedicates Bhatinda refinery to nation

Bhatinda, Apr 28 (ANI): Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh on Saturday dedicated the Guru Govind Singh Refinery at Bhatinda to the nation.

While congratulating the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, HPCL, Lakshmi Mittal and his company, HMEL and the Punjab Government on the successful completion of this project, Dr. Singh said the refinery fulfils the long cherished dream of the people of Punjab.

"This refinery will fulfill a long cherished dream of the people of Punjab and will make a big contribution towards economic development of the state," said Dr. Singh.

Underling the significance of the nine million metric tonne (MMT) refinery project, the he added that the refinery sector in the country has shown phenomenal growth and India has emerged as a refining hub. From 62 million metric tonnes per annum in 1998, the country's refining capacity has grown about three and a half times to 213 MMTPA today.

"We have sufficient refining capacity to enable us to export petroleum products," he added.

He also stated that the challenges we face on the energy front are formidable and underlined the need for adequate supplies of energy at affordable prices.

Calling for steps to conserve our scarce energy resources, Prime Minister Singh cautioned that there is no room for inefficient and wasteful usage of fuel.

"We also need to rationalize prices and at the same time ensure that the poor and needy are shielded from the effects of such a rationalization," he said.

Pointing out that domestic sources of crude oil and gas are inadequate to meet the growing demands, and the imports accounting for about 80 percent of the crude supplies, the spiraling prices of crude in the inter nation al market have put a severe strain on the import bill.

He emphasized that that in order to insulate the common man from the impact of rising oil prices, the government shoulders a sizeable portion of the burden by pricing diesel, Kerosene and domestic LPG below their market prices. (ANI)