India has passed legislation intended to encourage oil and gas exploration.
“[It’s a] historic day in India’s quest towards energy security and energy self-sufficiency,” oil minister Hardeep Singh Puri said after the lower house of parliament on Wednesday approved a bill amending the country’s 1948 law on oil extraction.
The “far-reaching” amendments would “further strengthen and propel India’s energy sector”, the oil minister said.
“By virtue of the fact that we are going to rely on conventional energy for some time, we need to step up our exploration and production activities,” Puri said, adding that India currently consumed 5.5mn barrels of crude oil a day, up from 5mn three-and-a-half years ago.
“If we continue to grow at the rate at which we are, we will go up to 6.5mn-7.0mn barrels per day,” he said.
Last month, Oil India signed an agreement with Brazil’s national oil company Petrobras to jointly bid for oil and gas exploration blocks in India.