Oil and refining major Indian Oil Corp had selected Ernst and Young as the financial consultant in October. "We have selected ILF as technical consultant as its bid was the lowest among three of the five bidders who qualified. We hope to finalize the legal consultants in a couple of days," a petroleum ministry official said recently. "The technical consultant has been given six weeks to two months to submit its pre-feasibility report as India, Pakistan and Iran have committed to conclude the tripartite framework agreement by 31 December", the official said. Pakistan is also in the process of appointing consultants for the 2,100-km pipeline, of which 1,100 km will be in Iran, 750km in Pakistan, and the remaining 250km in India. Iran has already got a pre-feasibility report done through global consultants BHP Billiton, which is being made available to India and Pakistan for reference. The Iran gas pipeline is seen as crucial to bridge the growing shortfall in India's gas requirement, with current availability being only 50% of demand.