Former RBI Governor & PM Modi's PS Shaktikanta Das Stresses Energy Security and Self-Reliance Amid Gulf Hostilities

Delhi: Amid escalating tensions in West Asia and the ongoing blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, India’s top policy circles are underscoring the urgent need for deeper energy self-reliance and diversified global partnerships, even as the country accelerates its clean energy transition.

Shaktikanta Das, Principal Secretary-2 to the Prime Minister of India, warned that the recent hostilities in the Gulf have revived painful memories of the severe supply-side disruptions and demand destruction witnessed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The West Asia crisis highlights the importance of energy security and self-reliance,” Das said in a detailed address in Delhi on Thursday.

“Over the last decade, India has made significant gains in energy security. Power sector reforms have addressed long-standing inefficiencies through tariff rationalisation, distribution restructuring, and financial discipline. Electricity is now central to India’s ambition in manufacturing, services, and urban development.”

Das noted that while India continues to modernise its energy ecosystem, it remains firmly committed to harnessing its conventional power sources alongside a rapid push towards renewables. 

“India is emerging as a global leader in renewable energy, driven by ambitious targets and green transition policies,” he added.

“Initiatives such as the National Green Hydrogen Mission and supportive regulatory measures have helped India attract substantial foreign and domestic investment in clean energy,” he said.

The senior official stressed that the current global environment of geopolitical fragmentation makes over-reliance on any single partner or supply chain increasingly risky.

“In today’s world of fragmentation, the corner solution is perhaps becoming less efficient,” Das observed. 

“It is now evident that resilience on one dominant partner creates vulnerability, not efficiency. No country or single supply chain remains the cheapest, safest, or most predictable on a sustained basis,” he added.

He pointed out that repeated global shocks over the past five years -- including the ongoing West Asia crisis -- have reinforced India’s policy of strategic self-reliance under the banner of Atmanirbhar Bharat.

“India’s approach to Atmanirbhar Bharat reflects a strategic commitment to self-reliance, shaped by realism, not isolation,” Das said. “Anchored in both economic and external policy, it seeks to build domestic capacity in critical technologies while reducing dependency on a single external source,” Das said.

The government is understood to be closely monitoring the situation in the Strait of Hormuz, through which a significant portion of India’s oil imports traditionally flow. Any prolonged disruption could put upward pressure on domestic fuel prices and inflation, even as the country maintains comfortable foreign exchange reserves and strategic petroleum reserves.

Das’s comments are seen as a clear signal that India will continue balancing its energy transition goals with the practical realities of energy security in an uncertain world -- pushing hard on solar, wind, green hydrogen, and battery storage while strengthening coal-based and nuclear power as bridge solutions and maintaining a multi-pronged import strategy.