Dharmendra Pradhan dedicates Bengal’s first oil and gas reserve to nation

New Delhi: West Bengal has found a place on the oil map of India and the development assumes significance months before the Assembly elections.

Union petroleum minister Dharmendra Pradhan was on a three-day trip to the state where he dedicated the eighth oil and gas producing basin to the nation in Ashok Nagar, around 47 km from the state capital Kolkata. The first proven reserve of oil and gas in the state was discovered in 2018. The Ashok Nagar field, which falls under the Mahanadi-Bengal-Andaman (MBA) basin, has proved to be commercially viable. Pradhan said two more wells will be explored under Open Acreage Licensing Policy.