India, June 17 -- Union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Hardeep Puri said India holds the potential of 'several Guyanas' in the Andaman region and outlined several measures taken by the government for exploration and production.

The minister said that the country has 3.5 million square kilometers of sedimentary basin, but it never explored beyond eight per cent area, keeping a large expanse of sea beds unexplored.

The minister's statement comes as India is putting in efforts to ramp up its own traditional fossil-based energy production.

"There were parts of the sedimentary basin which were no-go areas. So one of the decisions which we took was that 1 million square kilometers of that sedimentary basin, which was no-go area, has sudd...