India needs a simpler, more transparent and less intrusive regime for expediting oil and gas exploration. Speaking at the World Energy Forum in Dubai, Oil Minister S Jaipal Reddy said, the government plans to put in place a new exploration licensing regime.

Reddy said, a high level expert committee has been constituted, with the task of suggesting improvements to the policy. He said the new policy will be in place in the next few months.

The committee headed by Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council Chairman C Rangarajan is expected to submit recommendations on revamp of the exploration policy as well as the terms of contracts signed by companies to explore and produce oil and gas in next few days.

Its suggestions would be taken to the Cabinet for approval. Once Cabinet clears the changes, the 10th round of NELP would be launched.

The world's fourth-biggest oil importer wants to expedite domestic oil and gas hunt to cut its ballooning import bill and widening budget deficit, but its more than a decade-old New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP) has met with lukewarm response from global biggies.

Nine rounds of auction under NELP since 1999 have been lacklustre with global biggies staying away because of issues like tight regulations on pricing, delays in getting approvals and changing fiscal regime.

Current Production Sharing Contracts (PSCs), signed under the NELP of 1999 has come in for criticism from the CAG as it provides incentive to explorers to delay government's maximum profit take.

The Rangarajan panel may suggest moving to a production-linked payment regime where explorers may be asked to bid for a percentage of output they would share with the government. The firm offering the maximum, would win a block or area.