Indian Oil Corporation has planned to invest about Rs 15,000 crore to increase the capacity of Haryana’s Panipat refinery by 34% to 20.2 million tonnes (MT) by 2020. IOC, the Nation’s largest oil firm owns and operates eight refineries and has only a few weeks back added ninth refinery at Paradip in Odisha. With the inclusion of Paradip Refinery, the overall capacity has increased to 69.2 MT. IOC has regained its top slot among the refineries. It has surpassed Reliance Industries which has twin refineries at Jamnagar in Gujarat with a capacity of 62 MT.

Tidbits

• Panipat Refinery was commissioned in 1998 with a capacity of six MT per annum.
• The refining capacity was doubled to 12 MT in 2006 and then raised by a further three MT to 15 MT in 2010.
• IOC is world’s 88th largest corporation.
• IOC is mainly controlled by GOI which owns approximately 69% shares in the company. It is one of the seven Maharatna status companies of India.
• Manohar Lal Khattar is the current Chief Minister of Haryana.