India has opened 99% of its previously designated offshore “No-Go Area” for exploration as the government seeks to accelerate domestic resource discovery and strengthen the country’s energy security, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in his Independence Day address.
Addressing the nation from the ramparts of the Red Fort, Modi said India’s dependence on crude oil was partly the result of limitations in its earlier approach to resource exploration.
He said 99% of India’s coastal area had previously been designated as a “No-Go Area”, effectively restricting exploration activity. The government has now opened the area as a “Go-Ahead Area” and is moving towards exploring the sea and discovering new reserves.
The Prime Minister said India had announced the Samudra Manthan initiative last year as part of this effort and had recently decided to allocate ₹85,000 crore to accelerate the work.
The move is part of a wider energy-security strategy outlined during the address, in which Modi stressed the need for India to strengthen its own capabilities and reduce vulnerabilities arising from dependence on external resources.
He pointed to the growing importance of energy as India expands into technology-intensive sectors such as semiconductors, artificial intelligence and data centres, all of which require large quantities of electricity and reliable energy supplies.
The push for greater domestic exploration comes alongside the government’s emphasis on alternative sources of energy.
Modi highlighted India’s expansion in solar energy, saying solar capacity had increased from 2 GW before 2014 to 160 GW today. He also outlined a target of 100 GW of nuclear power by 2047, while pointing to hydrogen, energy storage and green mobility as emerging areas of the energy transition.
The Prime Minister’s remarks indicate that India’s energy strategy is being pursued across multiple fronts: expanding domestic exploration for conventional resources while simultaneously accelerating nuclear power and renewable and emerging energy technologies.
The opening of the former offshore No-Go Area, combined with the ₹85,000 crore allocation, adds a major upstream exploration component to this strategy and reflects the government’s stated objective of strengthening domestic resource security as India moves towards its 2047 development target.
