Oil giant Shell says it is serious about bidding for Hindustan Petroleum and is eagerly watching developments on the refiner's divestment process.

Marc den Hartog, director of Shell Gas & Power, said in Ahmedabad on Tuesday, "HPCL is a very big opportunity for us, much bigger than IBP, where we could not make it. But this time, we are very serious.

"We know the matter is in the Indian courts and we are keeping a watch on every development. We hope the courts will come out with their observations soon. We will definitely like to buy stake in this nationalised petroleum giant," Hartog said.

"There is a strong commitment from the board of Shell that India should be in our highest priority during the next few years. In the gas sector we have already made a substantial investment including the upcoming Rs 3,000 crore (Rs 30 billion) LNG Terminal project in Hazira."

Hartog, who was in Ahmedabad to take stock of LNG Terminal project in Hazira on the outskirts of Surat city, also made it clear that even if Shell does not qualify for the bidding process of HPCL, the company will set up its own retail chain across the country in the near future.

"We will go ahead with the plan and the first lot of petrol stations are expected to start operating by the middle of the next calendar year," he said.

"We are now busy in putting the things in place as far as retailing is concerned and also have initiated the process of identifying the locations for setting up the petrol stations. "Work for designing the stations has also been initiated by our retailing team, while work for ensuring safety and uninterrupted supply chain is also going on," he said.

Shell's petroleum retailing team is working out a design of its petro-stations according to the nature of various cities and towns and the locations.

"The design will change from location to location as a petrol station in a small town will have a different consumer focus than a petrol station in a major city such as Delhi. I am not in a position to divulge more, but our stations may have restaurants, markets, florists and some more things which will give our retail customers a pleasure to drive-in," he added.