No oil payment crisis with Iran now, please stop scaremongering, says Pranab Mukherjee

NEW DELHI: Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee has said India has resolved the oil payment crisis with Iran. "We had some problem with regard to making payment for the oil bill to Iran, but problem has been sorted out. Regular payment is taking place now," he said, adding that there were some outstandings which would be cleared in the course of time.

India imports about 20% of its crude oil from Iran. Mukherjee clarified that Iran has never threatened to stop oil supplies.

"I would like to dispel this impression that Iran has threatened to stop supplying oil to India. Please do not create scare in the country," he said. India imports 12 million barrels of crude oil every month from Iran.

India's crude oil imports from Iran faced an impasse since December last year after the Reserve Bank of India declared that a regional clearinghouse that involved the Iranian central bank could no longer be used to settle oil and gas transactions between the two countries.

Major importers of Iranian crude are Mangalore Refinery & Petrochemicals (MRPL), Essar Oil and Hindustan Petroleum Corp (HPCL). In April, HPCL had said that it had finalised a contract with Iran for supply of 3.5 million tonne (MT) crude oil for 2011-12.