Shri Dharmendra Pradhan, Minister for Petroleum & Natural Gas and Steel on December 20, 2020 dedicated the Bengal Basin, the 8th producing basin of India, to the nation. It is the also the first gas field in the West Bengal.
- With this discovery, Bengal Basin finally looks set to find a place on the oil & gas map of the world.
- Shri Dharmendra Pradhan, while dedicating the Asokenagar discovery to the nation, said that the discovery would play a role for India’s energy security.
Eight producing basins of India: Cambay, Assam Shelf, Mumbai offshore, Krishna Godavari, Cauvery, Assam Arakan Fold Belt, Rajasthan and Bengal Basin.
- The gas basin belongs to ONGC.
- ONGC took a major step by commencing oil production from the well Asokenagar-1, Bengal Basin in 24 Paragana district.
- The well Asoknagar-1 was completed as an oil producer under Early-Monetization Plan issued by Government of India. This makes ONGC having discovered and put to production seven out of the eight producing basins of India covering 83 percent of established oil & gas reserves.
- ONGC is India’s largest oil and gas producer contributing 72 percent of the country’s hydrocarbon production.
- The well Asokenagar-1 has heralded the end of painstaking search for hydrocarbons in the region by ONGC by sending its first hydrocarbon consignment produced during well testing to IOCL’s Haldia Oil Refinery done earlier on 5 November 2020.
