Examine India's policy evolution in hydrocarbon exploration in frontier/foothill basins from nomination-basis licensing to NELP/OALP regimes.

India's frontier acreage — the Himalayan foothills and Ganga foredeep — has been explored under successively liberalised licensing regimes, yet with 85% crude import dependence [4] the shift from nomination to open acreage remains a story of better process but thin results.

Phase I: Nomination-basis licensing

• Acreage was allotted administratively to PSUs without competition: Oil India Limited holds the Kashipur block PEL in the foothills of Uttarakhand–Uttar Pradesh on nomination basis [1].
• ONGC similarly held nomination PELs in Jammu & Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh, limiting risk capital to the public sector [1].

Phase II: NELP (1999–2016) — competitive bidding

• Blocks were offered in periodic rounds on government-notified acreage; block HF-ONN-2001/1 in the Himachal foothills went to ONGC under NELP-III [1].
• Introduced level playing field for private/foreign players, but bidders could only choose from what the State offered.

Phase III: HELP/OALP (2016 onwards)

• Uniform licence for all hydrocarbons, revenue-sharing in place of cost-recovery, and marketing-pricing freedom; 172 blocks over 3.78 lakh sq km awarded across nine OALP rounds [6].
• Frontier-specific sweeteners: lower royalty and concessions for Category-II and III basins [6]; the Discovered Small Field Policy and Hydrocarbon Vision 2030 target stranded North-East fields [1].
• The Oilfields (Regulation and Development) Amendment Act, 2024 brought shale gas and CBM within "mineral oils" and created a single petroleum lease [5] — legally unlocking the Ganga Valley shale resource within ONGC's 187.5 TCF five-basin estimate [3].

Persisting gaps

• Sub-Siwalik thrust-fold structures make seismic imaging poor; no commercial foothill discovery yet.
• Funding lags policy: 2025-26 capital spending was Rs 1,407 crore against Rs 6,626 crore budgeted, with the Standing Committee urging utilisation of capital budgets for exploration [4].

Policy has thus moved from administrative allotment to investor-led acreage choice, while Assam still supplies ~14% of crude [1]. Converting liberalisation into output now needs assured appraisal spending, early notification of environmental rules, and data-acquisition obligations — aligning frontier exploration with SDG-7's energy-security goal.