Petrochem foray: GAIL may rope in RIL

Inside the boardroom of India's largest gas transmission firm Gas Authority of India Limited or GAIL, a new plan is taking shape to turn the company into big petrochemicals player. For that, the company is planning to partner with none other than petrochemicals giant Reliance Industries, for starters the two companies are planning to set up a new plant overseas. "Petrochemicals plant overseas, identifying locations yes, Reliance could be a partner, countries identified include Qatar, Egypt," CMD of GAIL UD Choubey said. GAIL has already entered into a tie-up with Reliance Industries for transporting its KG basin gas and now petrochemicals seems to be a natural extension of this partnership. Whether or not the overseas plans works out, GAIL is moving fast to expand its existing Pata plant and also a new plant in India. "Vizag is an obvious choice, we are likely to partner with HPCL," U D Choubey said. All these plans have forced GAIL to hike its total capital expenditure for the next five years to Rs 30,000 crore, but the immediate good news for GAIL investors is that bonus issue might be on the cards