State-owned oil & gas explorer ONGC suffered a steep decline of nearly 34 per cent in its standalone net profit during the first three months of the current financial year.

On Monday, August 12, the explorer announced that its standalone net profit slipped 33.9 per cent, from Rs 6,077.70 crore in the April to June quarter of 2012 to Rs 4,015.98 crore in the same quarter of 2013.

Analysts had projected a net profit of Rs 4,900 crore for the public sector explorer's first fiscal quarter of this year.

Total income slipped from Rs 21,216.24 crore to Rs 20,505.03 crore.

Commenting on the results, senior research analyst Bhavesh Chauhan said, "INGC's first quarter net profit was below our and street expectations on account of higher than expected subsidy."

The explorer also underlined that hefty subsidy payout impacted its net profit by Rs 7,131 crore.

ONGC as well as Oil India have also expressed their displeasure on the government's decision of making these two public sector explorers bear higher subsidy for power and fertilizer producers. ONGC Chairman Sudhir Vasudeva said any increase in the subsidy burden would be detrimental.