HPCL has reported a higher net profit of 17 per cent at Rs 1,057.41 crore as against Rs 901.26 crore in the previous year. BPCL's net profit crawled to Rs 703.9 crore from Rs 701.3 crore which has been attributed to lower refiners margin, non-updation of marketing margins and higher procurement of LPG cylinders which have been depreciated at 100 per cent.

While HPCL's gross turnover increased by 32 per cent to Rs 34,368.03 crore from Rs 25,994.56 crore, that of BPCL was up 39 per cent to Rs 35,743 crore. The HPCL board also gave its go-ahead to go it alone for the nine million tonne Punjab refinery. A press release issued by BPCL states that market sales registered a significant growth of 7.8 per cent to 18.86 million tonnes from 17.50 million tonnes. The refinery recorded a crude throughput of 8.87 million tonnes (8.94 mmt) despite planned shotdowns during October-November 1999. BPCL also implemented the revised pay scales for management staff with retrospective effect from April 1, 1997.

The HPCL statement says that stock-in-process has been valued at raw material cost plus proportionate operating cost as against raw material cost adopted upto last year. This has boosted profit by Rs 3.36 crore. As regards depreciation, unlike BPCL, HPCL has from the current year changed the rate from 100 per cent to 16.21 per cent as per Schedule XIV of the Companies Act. Had the above changes not been made, net profit before tax would have been lower by Rs 105.55 crore.