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India bids for Mozambique oil and gas field stake: report

Indian men drive bullock carts used for transporting oil in Mumbai on April 23, 2008. State-run energy giant ONGC and Oil India have made a joint bid for a 20 percent stake in a Mozambique oil and gas field operated by US-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp, a report said on Friday

State-run energy giant ONGC and Oil India have made a joint bid for a 20 percent stake in a Mozambique oil and gas field operated by US-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp, a report said on Friday. ONGC's wholly owned unit, ONGC Videsh Ltd., and Oil India have bid for shares being sold by Anadarko and India's Videocon Industries, Dow Jones Newswires said. The report, quoting an unidentified person with direct knowledge of the bid, comes as the energy-hungry South Asian nation expresses interest in purchasing hydrocarbon assets abroad. If the bid results in a stake purchase, it could be one of India's biggest foreign deal in the oil-and-gas sector and might also see emerging market giants India and China working together, the report said. It follows a deal Thursday between Italian oil producer Eni SpA and China National Petroleum Corp. under which Eni would sell a 20 percent stake in its Mozambique offshore natural-gas field to the Chinese firm for $4.21 billion. Eni and Anadarko have an agreement to coordinate on their offshore Mozambique reservoirs as well as to build common on-shore LNG liquefaction facilities in the northern part of the African country. ONGC Videsh's $5 billion offer last November to buy an 8.4 percent stake from Texas-based ConocoPhillips in a Kazakhstan field is so far the biggest overseas bid by an Indian energy company. The deal still needs the approval of the governments of India and Kazakhstan.