KG Basin gas migration dispute: Supreme Court appoints Justice Ranjana Desai as sole mediator

Former Supreme Court Judge Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai. File | Photo Credit: Sandeep Saxena The Supreme Court on Friday (October 30, 2026) appointed former apex court judge Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai as sole mediator in the Krishna-Godavari (KG) basin gas migration dispute between Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), along with its consortium partners, and the Union government.A Special Bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant, Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul Pancholi was informed by Attorney-General R. Venkataramani, appearing for the Centre, that a viable solution could not be arrived at among the parties.Senior advocate A.M. Singhvi appeared for RIL, and agreed to the suggestion made by the Bench to have Justice Desai as the sole mediator.The court said the dispute was “very complex” in nature, and would require the expertise of someone like Justice Desai, who was well-versed in commercial matters. “We also request the learned mediator to have the assistance of two domain experts, as may be suggested by the parties, for the aforesaid purpose,” the Bench said.Mr. Venkataramani assured to provide full cooperation to the mediator.“The parties may contact Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai during the course of the day or by tomorrow and fix the date and time as per her convenience,” the Bench said.On an earlier occasion, in May 2026, RIL had conveyed to the court its intention to write to the Union government to attempt a conciliation in the dispute.RIL, BP Exploration (Alpha) Limited and Niko (NECO) Limited have assailed the February 14, 2025 order of the Delhi High Court setting aside an order of a Single Judge Bench, which had upheld the arbitral award in favour of the RIL-led consortium for allegedly “migrating”of gas belonging to the state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation from the KG basin off the Andhra Pradesh coast.In July 2018, an international arbitration tribunal had rejected the government’s claim of USD 1.55 billion against RIL and its partners for allegedly “siphoning” gas from deposits they had no right to exploit.RIL has refuted the Centre’s claim that RIL “siphoned” gas that had migrated from the neighbouring blocks of state-owned ONGC into RIL’s KG-D6 block.Mr. Singhvi had contended that the gas flow was a purely physical phenomenon driven by pressure differentials, comparing it to “osmosis”. The senior lawyer had countered the “theft” allegation as technically and legally flawed. He said that RIL spent USD 7.4 billion on an ultra-deepwater project, a “frontier of subsea engineering” where other operators, including ONGC had struggled to produce for years.“It is the single largest success story in domestic gas production, contributing 30 percent of India’s output. Yet, I stand accused of theft,” Mr. Singhvi had said in an earlier hearing. eom Published - October 30, 2026 12:32 pm IST