The 11th India–Japan Energy Dialogue and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Tokyo in August put energy at center stage, with critical minerals as one of the key aspects of economic strategies.

At the end of August, India’s Ministry of External Affairs released a Fact Sheet on India–Japan Economic Security Cooperation, identifying semiconductors, critical minerals and clean energy, etc, as priority sectors for collaboration. Both governments pledged support for private sector–led initiatives and emphasized cooperation through multilateral frameworks such as the Mineral Security Partnership, the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, and Quad Critical Minerals Initiatives.

Concrete measures have been taken in this direction, like India’s Ministry of Mines and METI signed a Memorandum of Cooperation in August, while Toyota Tsusho expanded its rare earths refining project in Andhra Pradesh, India to set up a stable supply chain. Meanwhile, initiatives like the battery supply chain roundtable organized by JETRO in India signal appetite for further cross-border links.

Yet despite this momentum, much of the agenda still consists of frameworks, dialogues, and memoranda rather than large-scale projects. This “pending promises” gap is striking, particularly given Japan’s own track record of building durable supply chain architecture in response to past crises (see author’s analysis in Japan NRG, June 2, 2025), and India’s rising urgency to reduce its critical mineral dependencies.

While opportunities span joint exploration, refining, recycling, and technology collaboration, persistent challenges of policy execution, infrastructure, and investor confidence continue to weigh on delivery. Whether Tokyo and New Delhi can now translate complementary strengths into concrete outcomes will determine whether critical minerals become a genuine pillar of their partnership, or remain aspirational.

𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑛 𝑒𝑥𝑐𝑒𝑟𝑝𝑡 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑎 𝑔𝑢𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑝𝑖𝑒𝑐𝑒 𝑏𝑦 𝐷𝑟. 𝑃𝑎𝑟𝑢𝑙 𝐵𝑎𝑘𝑠ℎ𝑖, 𝑤ℎ𝑜 𝑖𝑠 𝑎 𝑉𝑖𝑠𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑅𝑒𝑠𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑐ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑎𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐼𝑛𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑡𝑢𝑡𝑒 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝐹𝑢𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒 𝐼𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑈𝑛𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑖𝑡𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑇𝑜𝑘𝑦𝑜 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑎 𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑖𝑝𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐽𝑎𝑝𝑎𝑛 𝐹𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝐼𝑛𝑑𝑜-𝑃𝑎𝑐𝑖𝑓𝑖𝑐 𝑃𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑠ℎ𝑖𝑝 𝐹𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑜𝑤𝑠ℎ𝑖𝑝.