India wants Qatar to lower price of gas under long-term LNG deal: Dharmendra Pradhan

By Nidhi Verma

MUMBAI (Reuters) - India is seeking to renegotiate the long-term contract price of liquefied natural gas (LNG) it buys from Qatar, Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said on Monday in New Delhi.

"We need to re-examine the pricing mechanism" of the long-term natural gas deal with Qatar, Pradhan said at a gathering of industry officials that included Qatar's Energy Minister Saad Sherida al-Kaabi and Indian state-owned oil company officials.

India imports 8.5 million tonnes of liquefied natural gas (LNG) annually under long-term supply deals with Qatar.

Kaabi is in New Delhi to meet his counterpart.

"We are looking how we can increase our cooperation," Kaabi responded when asked if he was willing to renegotiate the deals because spot prices have declined.

Kaabi, who is also the chief executive of Qatar Petroleum, was accompanied by the chief executive of Qatar Gas, Sheikh Khalid bin Khalifa Al Thani.

Delivered spot prices to Indian ports are about half of those under the long-term LNG deals, reducing the appeal of the Qatar supply contracts for price sensitive Indian consumers.

In 2015, India managed to renegotiate the contract price of LNG imported from Qatar to half of what it was paying earlier.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said India needs to increase the share of natural gas in its energy mix to 15% by 2030 from 6.5% now.

(Reporting by Nidhi Verma; Writing by Promit Mukherjee; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Tom Hogue)