India's Overseas Critical-Minerals Push, and the Case for Domestic Recovery

India's overseas critical minerals push is gathering pace. Coal India has applied for a lithium licence in Chile. KABIL and Coal India are also in talks with SQM for further stakes. So far, the only completed deal is five lithium blocks in Argentina, secured in 2024. It's a necessary move: India imports nearly 100% of its lithium, cobalt and nickel today.

But overseas supply takes time. Coal India's own leadership has said Chile mining could take two to three years to start, even in the best case. And owning a mine abroad doesn't fully solve the problem either: refining is still concentrated in a handful of countries, so even mineral-rich deals overseas can leave India dependent on someone else's processing capacity.

Domestic recovery sidesteps both problems. Every EV, phone and inverter battery already sold in India is lithium, cobalt and nickel that never has to cross a border, clear a foreign licence, or wait on someone else's refinery. It's recovered, processed and put back into the supply chain here. With EPR rules on batteries tightening, that recovery loop is only going to matter more over the next few years, for OEMs and recyclers alike.

Overseas acquisitions and domestic recycling aren't competing strategies. They're two sides of the same resource security question, and right now only one is getting the headlines. Securing tomorrow's minerals abroad is the right move. Recovering the minerals already in India deserves the same push.