The isolated bacterial strains of Planomicrobium chinense, Bacillus cereus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Klebsiella oxytoca from central India are implied to be potential degraders of petroleum hydrocarbons. Diesel degrading and IAA producing strain of P. chinense may be used as a promising plant growth promoter under xenobiotic stress conditions after strain improvement. Such findings are likely to provide an insight into the exploitation of such microorganisms for degradation of diesel oil spills in tropical environment. Further studies on characterizing the genes of the four strains is likely to throw more light on the molecular mechanism underlying the process of bioremediation.