India asks ONGC to invest ₹15,000 crore in a 1.75 MMT strategic oil reserve at Mangaluru

India’s government has asked Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) to build and fill a 1.75 million metric tonne underground strategic petroleum reserve at Mangaluru, requiring an investment of about ₹15,000 crore ($1.6 billion). The project would lift India’s existing emergency crude storage capacity of 5.33 MMT by about one-third. India held 21 million barrels of strategic crude stocks at the end of 2025, far below levels in China, the US and Japan, according to the US Energy Information Administration. The move follows supply risks highlighted by the Iran war.