Government's auditor CAG has constituted a high-level team for auditing Reliance Industries' expenses on eastern offshore KG D-6 fields and the exercise will begin this month.
The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), which has been asked to do special audit of not only RIL but also Cairn India's Rajasthan block and British energy firm BG Group-operated Panna/Mukta and Tapti fields, has constituted various teams for undertaking the audit, sources in the know said.
It is understood that CAG is thinking of deploying a high profile team comprising P K Mishra, Principal Director, A K Awasthi, Additional Deputy Director, and Dharamendra Kumar, Director, besides many auditors.
It is also understood that scope of this audit will far exceed the normal course of audit by CAG and the prime objective may be to detect fraud, if any, by the operator (RIL) allegedly in collusion with oil regulator DGH and Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas.
It is expected that the audit may take several months to complete, the sources said.
CAG was asked by the Oil Ministry to audit the accounts of RIL, which is facing allegations of gold-plating gas field costs that has increased four-fold to $8.8 billion. RIL had on August 17 agreed to an audit by the counry's premier audit body.