Jordan Blum, editorial director, Hart Energy: We are here at CERAWeek 2025. I am joined by Hitesh Vaid, the CFO of Cairn [Oil & Gas] India. Thank you so much for joining us. We are just talking about kind of translating some of the best practices in the U.S. to shale in India. You know, kind of early days a little bit, but I wanted to get your thoughts on just the approach you're taking and who you're working with, with some of the top U.S.-European services players. How are things going so far?

Hitesh Vaid: No, I think first of all, thanks for this opportunity. Just to give a brief introduction, Cain Oil & Gas is part of Vedanta Group. It is India's largest private sector player. We contribute around 25% of India's domestic production, and our objective is to double our production. To meet that objective, we have acquired [assets] over the last four or five years and now we are in a position where we have tangible projects, which can help us to reach our vision of doubling our own contribution towards India's production. Of course, we all know that India is heavily dependent on imports, 85% for oil and 50% of gas. So we want to play that role in providing that energy security for the country. Now, as far as projects, which we have identified, the needle mover for us as far as near term volume growth is concerned is enhancing recovery from our existing fields as well as monetizing the tight oil discoveries, which we have done in the past. And on an exploration side, it is shale and deepwater. Now what brings us to Houston is this is the place where things have been done. We want to learn from this experience, work with the partners which are based here and replicate that success in India. So we are looking for that technology as well as the business partners from this region who can help us translate the success which is achieved in this part of the world to our part of the world.

JB: Great. So yeah, I know you all are working with or talking to the who's who of the industry here. I mean Halliburton, SLB, Baker Hughes, if you want to elaborate.

HV: Yeah. So the players such as Halliburton, Schlumberger, Baker, they have been, the traditional players have been working for us for a number of years and we have a great partnership with them. It is in fact with them whom we have worked over the last 20 years to build the large portfolio, which we have. Now, we are looking at more partners, especially we are focusing first on bringing international rigs from this part of the world to our part of the world. Plus we are also looking at some of the players who provide EPCM [engineering, procurement and construction management] services so that it'll help us to move into that journey much faster compared to a traditional approach. We are also looking at some of the technology providers in this part of the world where we can look at how they execute in the fields around this part of the world and how can we leverage those technologies. Ultimately, our objective is to create the ecosystem because whether it is shale, whether it is deepwater for us, and the new rounds also, which India has offered are a deepwater and ultra-deepwater. So from a traditional base off onshore, we are moving towards deepwater. So we want to replicate the ecosystem which is existing here into India.

JB: Great. Can I get you to talk too about I guess the different regions you all are focused on? I know there's the more arid Barmer region to the far west and then in the far northeast, I mean you have the Assam area.

HV: Correct. So in India, Barmer, which is the onshore field, was discovered more than 20 years backed by us, and we have produced more than 800 million barrels and that is the major contributor in our production. Around 80% of our volume is coming from this field and it still holds tremendous potential. One is we are accelerating recovery by implementing enhanced oil recovery projects. We had done polymer recovery five, six years back, seven years back. Now we are going through a ASP [alkaline surfactant polymer] recovery model where we'll be spending say close to a billion dollars. Beyond this in the same field, we have a number of tighter field discoveries, which we actually have not yet monetized. The in place volume is 1.5 billion barrels, which is huge. We had got some limited success by using fracking technologies from this part of the world, but now we are trying to expand it too much larger play and that will give us an immediate volume jump, which we think based on the technology which we are replicating from this part of the world beyond Rajasthan, we are having production on the shallow waters both on the east and the west coast of India.

These are also fields producing for more than 20, 25 years, but now we have acquired additional acreages around that area, which is near term exploration or appraisal, and we intend to develop both of the regions also as a production hub and contributing a much significant portion compared to say 20% today. The most interesting part in our portfolio from an onshore field is northeast. Northeast is part of India, has tremendous potential. In fact, one of the first discoveries in that part of the world was done way back 150 years back, but it has not been developed the way it should have happened. But now we have got a large acreage there, more than 15 blocks, and we have started exploration. We are seeing some immediate benefits out of those wells, which we have drilled, and I think from our point of view, we are going to replicate success which we had in Rajasthan in northeast, and make it a big oil and production hub for India.

And beyond the onshore part in deepwater, we now have a block, which is interesting. There are discoveries in this block. Next year, we want to drill a three to four exploration wells and based on data which we have, we think it is multi-Tcf volumes which are in place. So that's an area where we are moving ahead. We are already in the market scouting for rigs. Beyond the acreage, which we have, what we are also trying to build is build a portfolio of other blocks, which we want to put into our own portfolio. And there the government of India has announced a new round, which is OALP [open acreage licensing policy] 10 round, and that is primary focused on deepwater and ultra-deepwater. So we are also looking at not only partnerships but joint venture partners. A lot of global players have now expressed interest in coming into India.

And India is not shy of attracting investment for oil and gas compared to say some other parts of the world. And now we can see here also now a lot of focus on that oil and gas investment. So that is also a partnership opportunity, which we're looking for from the operators from this part of the world. And last part, which I'll add is India has not so far invested on unconventional resources, especially on the shale side. And now we are going to deliver first shale well in June end or early July. And I think we believe that that's a big potential and that's the place we are replicating a lot of success from this part of the world and trying to either bring the rigs or the service providers to ensure that we do what is right or what has been done right here rather than have our own learning curve. So that's the one big area, which is our near term focus as well.

JB: Very good. And you've mentioned energy security earlier. Just wanted to see if you could maybe elaborate just a bit on with demand growing so rapidly in India, just how important that is to grow that domestic production fairly quickly.

HV: So yeah, I think in today's world for any country energy security is the most important factor. And India, while we have been importing a large amount of oil, as I said, 85% oil and gas, 50%, but a large part of India is unexplored, more than 70% is still to be explored. Towards that end, the government of India has recently announced a lot of policy measures with an intent to attract a lot of players into India so that the next phase of exploration could be accelerated. And I think oil and gas is still going to be just one part of that mode of providing energy security. Other than that, the fossil fuels, there is a lot of focus on renewables and other sources, and I think for a country like India, it is not about the choices and it's and/or, right? So [we] focus on all parts, because ultimately what we need to provide to the people of the country is not only energy, but something which is sustainable and which is affordable. So a lot of positive steps and that's why you feel that a lot of investment is going to flow into India, especially into the oil and gas sector. And we being the only private player who seriously investing in India, in the upstream business, we are a natural partner to a lot of players who want to come into India and be part of that journey to provide energy security.

JB: Great. Well, thank you so much for joining us here at CERAWeek. I hope you enjoy the rest of the week.

HV: No, thank you. Thank you. Great talking to you as well.

JB: To read and watch more, please visit online at HartEnergy.com.

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