Mr. S. P. Rao

Chairman & Managing Director,

GAIL (India) Ltd.

India and Uzbekistan share historical and cultural ties. Zahiriddin Muhammad Babur, who founded the Moghul Empire in India, hailed from Uzbekistan. Even before Uzbekistan achieved independence, Indian leaders visited Uzbekistan, the most famous instance being in 1966 when the peace agreement between India and Pakistan known as the Tashkent Declaration was signed. The Tashkent International Film Festival has always drawn many cinema connoisseurs from India. Even after Uzbekistan’s independence. The relations and contact between the two countries has only gotten closer.

The two countries share common values such as secularism, tolerance and strong opposition to the forces of fundamentalism. Uzbekistan and India have been working together in the interest of peace and stability in the region and well being and prosperity of the people. The cooperation between the two friendly countries spans many areas such as economic and commercial, cultural, education and technical training in diverse disciplines, information technology, science and technology, agriculture and civil aviation etc, having as many as 42 agreements to promote cooperation in the diverse fields.

GAIL (India) Ltd. India’s premier natural gas company has developed close ties with UzbekNefteGaz (UNG), Uzbekistan’s natural gas major for cooperation in the energy sector. Both the companies have recently signed a Memorandum of Cooperation Agreement (MoC) to cement their ties. The two companies will jointly pursue gas sector projects covering Exploration and Production, Gas processing/ LPG, Production of Petrochemicals as well as Training.

GAIL plans to set up an LPG plant in the western parts of Uzbekistan along with UzbekNefteGaz. The plant will produce LPG predominantly for consumption in the domestic market of Uzbekistan.

Preliminary discussions on E&P opportunities in Uzbekistan have already been held between the two companies. In a bid to benefit from GAIL’s expertise in the city gas ventures, the Indian gas major has been requested to assist UzTransGaz, a gas distribution subsidiary of UNG, in the development of CNG and city gas distribution in various cities of Uzbekistan—including Tashkent, Samarkand and Bukhara.

In addition to this, setting up of ethane extraction unit (C2/C3) and construction of 60-km transportation pipeline are the other areas of cooperation between the two companies.

“Diplomatist”, October 2006