Reliance Industries and oil explorer, Cairn India have been denied an opportunity to present their views on the audit objections.

The CAG has suggested that the ministry and its technical arm, the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons, are not much considerate about increase in capital expenditure and giving additional area in violation of the Production Sharing Contracts (PSCs).

Afterwards, the Oil Ministry has asked the CAG to allow the private operators to present their views. In addition to this, it added that the contracts have seen and replied to the audit requisitions and memos only.

"In the interactive meeting, one of the operators gave a presentation on how the project was executed and no audit observations were discussed. In the other meeting, only one observation was discussed with the operator”, stated the oil minister to CAG on June 22. "The operators were not given any draft report before this meeting so that they could have come prepared with some reply”.

While responding to the Oil Ministry, the CAG has claimed that its “audit mandate, scope and coverage" did not provide for seeking a response on its draft observations and the government could raise audit objections after it had finalized its report and the same was tabled in parliament.