A century ago, Sir Winston Churchill recognised that ‘Safety and certainty in oil lies in variety and variety alone.’ Energy diplomacy goals should crucially go beyond engaging energy partners and must include India’s entire neighbourhood, both immediate and extended. There are several economic challenges to India’s energy security - demand and supply issues, gas pricing issues, high costs of installing power plants, inefficient allocation of resources, need for reform, and challenge of deregulation and (over) dependence on imports are just some of these.
It is clear that India’s energy crisis is multidimensional, but these seemingly different aspects are also intricately interconnected. Inherent to these challenges is an overarching political aspect to the crisis and this is not specific to India.