New Delhi: Reliance Natural Resources Limited (RNRL) chief Anil Ambani met Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh at his official residence on Wednesday morning and reportedly expressed his views on the Supreme Court's verdict on the Krishna Godavari Basin Gas row. Before his meeting with Dr Singh
that lasted for an hour, Ambani also met the Prime Minister's Principal Secretary,
TKA Nair, for about ten minutes. He is also expected to meet Power Secretary P
Uma Shankar and Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde later in the day. Earlier on
May 7, Ambani had said that he would not challenge the verdict of the apex court
that that gave his brother, Mukesh's Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), the advantage
in the Krishna Godavari Basin Gas row. Delivering a judgement on the Krishna Godavari
Basin Gas row between Anil Ambani's RNRL and Mukesh Ambani's RIL, a three judge
bench of the apex court, consisting former Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan, Justices
P Sathasivam and B Sudershan Reddy said only the government can decide rates of
these resources. Quashing the family formula evolved by Kokilaben Ambani to solve
the long drawn out dispute between her two sons, Anil and Mukesh, over sharing
of gas, the court asked both to solve the matter through renegotiations within
six weeks. The apex court had said the RIL cannot supply gas to the RNRL and its
power plants at 234 dollars per unit, which is what the brothers had agreed to
in a private agreement in 2005. The RIL has since challenged the price, arguing
that it should be allowed to charge more, because the government has asked for
higher prices. The court held that gas belongs entirely to the government and
it alone has the right to decide gas prices. Anil maintained that he was rather
looking forward to successful re-negotiation with RIL over the next 6 weeks as
directed by the court. Aiming to arrest the fall of the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani
Group (ADAG) stocks in the market, Anil maintained that the court had safeguarded
the interest of 2.5 million RNRL shareholders. The stock is trading down by 20
percent ever since the verdict came in.
