Union Oil & Gas Minister M Veerappa Moily has announced that he has worked out a uniform gas price policy to bring parity in the prices of locally-produced and imported gas.

Mr. Moily pointed out that imported gas currently costs higher than the gas that is produced locally, and that the price of the fuel depends on the country where it is imported from.

Speaking on the topic, he said, "In Qatar it is a little less (18 USD), other countries it is 21 USD. Shale gas may work out very cheap. Now we are working towards parity (in price) between imported and domestic gas."

The Union Minister for Petroleum & Natural Gas, however, added that he didn't know whether the uniform gas price policy would go to the Cabinet or not.

The Minister claimed that the government was clearing obstacles in the way to implementing the New Exploration Licensing Policy to help more and more exploration projects to become operational sooner than later to ease out the situation.

Around 40 oil & gas blocks have already been approved under the New Exploration Licensing Policy, but these projects have been objected by some departments like defence and environment. Around US$13 billion have already been invested in these projects.

Mr. Moily believes that India may achieve self-sufficiency in gas by FY2016-17.