No Noble Gases

A new government policy has made it easier to dig deeper for unconventional oil and gas. But a village in Tamil Nadu is up in arms against the risks involved in the extraction of these fuels.

- Shreeshan Venkatesh

IN MARCH 2016, the Central gov-ernment brought about a critical change in the country’s hydrocarbon exploration policy. It replaced the New Exploration Licensing Policy (nelp), which had been in existence for 18 years, with the Hydrocarbon Exploration and Licensing Policy (help). Under help, the requirement for separate licences to explore and extract conventional as well as unconventional oil and gas resources, including cbm (coal-bed methane), shale gas/oil and gas hydrates, was replaced by a single licence. The move is part of the Central government’s strategy to increase competitiveness in hydrocarbon exploration, reduce India’s dependence on imports and give contractors a relaxed time frame and more freedom to explore and extract hydrocarbons.

But a solitary oil rig on the outskirts of Neduvasal village in Tamil Nadu’s Pudukkottai district sticks out like a sore thumb in the government’s ambitious plans. A day after the Director General of Hydrocarbons (dgh)—under the Union petroleum ministry—announced that the 10 square kilometres of land on which the rig is located was to be auctioned along with 43 other sites, the village residents began protests. This was in February 2017. On March 27, private player Gem Labs obtained the exploratory and production rights of the site, even as the protests continued. In April, participation in the protests has swollen with students arriving from different parts of the state.