The Calcutta Telegraph: Twin Push for Gas Pipelines

India will simultaneously push for two gas pipelines originating from Central Asia, one from Kazakhstan and the other from Turkmenistan, during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit there this month, in a bid to hedge its bets in the mineral-rich but politically fragile region.

India is nudging Turkmenistan to begin construction of a pipeline in December that is planned to be routed through Afghanistan and Pakistan, almost 20 years after the project was conceived, senior officials have said.

But simultaneously, oil and gas minister Dharmendra Pradhan told Kazakh interlocutors at a meeting last month that India would conduct a feasibility study to examine the possibility of a pipeline routed through Iran and the Persian Gulf.

Modi will visit Uzbekistan and then Kazakhstan on the first leg of his Central Asia trip on July 6 and July 7, before travelling to Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan from July 11 to July 13. The two segments are broken by a visit to Russia from July 8 to July 10. MORE