The Deep Ocean Mission (DOM) is a flagship, multi-disciplinary, and multi-ministerial scheme of the Government of India, approved in June 2021 by the Cabinet, with an estimated cost of ₹4077 Crore for the period 2021-2026. The mission is implemented by the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES). Its origin is rooted in the need to explore and sustainably utilize the vast resources within India's 2.2 million sq. km Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and the deep sea, aligning with the government's vision of the 'blue economy'. The mission aims to solve the problem of resource security, particularly for critical minerals, and to enhance India's scientific and technological self-reliance in the maritime domain.
The mission works through six major components, or "verticals," which include the development of technologies for deep-sea mining and a manned submersible, and the creation of Ocean Climate Change Advisory Services. A key provision is the development of the MATSYA-6000 manned submersible, which is designed to carry three people to a depth of 6,000 metres in the Indian Ocean. This is part of the sub-project informally dubbed Samudrayaan. The primary resource focus is the exploration and eventual extraction of polymetallic nodules (PMN), which contain valuable minerals like manganese, nickel, cobalt, and copper, from the Central Indian Ocean Basin (CIOB).
The Deep Ocean Mission connects directly to India's status as a "Pioneer Investor," a designation received in 1987 from the International Seabed Authority (ISA) under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). This status granted India exclusive rights to explore a 75,000 sq. km site in the CIOB for PMN. The mission is also a key initiative under the Prime Minister's Science, Technology, and Innovation Advisory Council (PM-STIAC). There have been no major recent changes to the mission's structure, but significant progress has been made, such as the completion of the design and system engineering for MATSYA-6000 and the successful demonstration of a deep-sea nodule collector in 2024.