press trust of india, New Delhi, July 14: The oil ministry has reverted to the mechanism of promoters selecting CEO of Petronet LNG after it scrapped an ad-hoc search committee formed under the previous petroleum secy.
A new Search Committee comprising representatives of all Petronet’s four promoter PSUs – GAIL, IOC, ONGC and BPCL – as well as GdF of France has been formed to select the new chief executive officer (CEO) of India’s biggest liquefied natural gas importer, officials said. Applications have been invited by July 15, the day incumbent AK Balyan completes his 5-year term.
The Search Committee will scrutinise applications and interview candidates and select a CEO, they said.
The then oil secy Saurabh Chandra had in March constituted a three-member panel headed by ONGC chairman Dinesh K Sarraf. Besides Sarraf, the committee included two independent directors of Petronet, the first such instance where independent directors were involved in the selection of CEO of a company.
Sources said the committee’s constitution was questioned by at least one promoter director. The panel could not come up with a consensus by April-end from among seven applicants, including Pramod K Bajpai, the then director (finance) of BHEL and an IIT Kanpur batchmate of Chandra, they said.
