Mumbai

Russia’s top oil producer Rosneft said on Wednesday that it had reached a preliminary agreement with India’s Essar Group about acquiring up to 49 percent of the Vadinar oil refinery in India. Rosneft also signed a deal to supply 10 million tonnes (200,000 barrels per day) of oil per year to the refinery over 10 years. About USD 6 billion in size, the deal — the second-largest FDI deal in the past several years following BP’s investment in RIL’s KG-D6 block — envisages Essar’s Vadinar refinery upping its capacity from the current 20 million tPA to 45 million tPA by 2020. It also proposes increasing the number of Essar’s fuel retailing chains in India from the current 1,600 to 5,000 in two years.