Cairn India Limited, a sister concern of Cairn Energy PLC, hopes to find oil and natural gas in flood-prone north Bihar.

The company plans to begin drilling in Bihar's Gangetic basin by next year. It has completed the seismic surveys and is currently studying the data collected to understand the geological structures below the surface.

"We plan to start drilling in 2008. We completed the seismic survey last month and are currently processing the data collected to locate exact place for the drilling operation", Sandeep Bhandari, a Cairn India official, told rediff.com in Patna on Wednesday.

According to him, drilling is not possible during the monsoon because of floods, an annual feature in north Bihar.

Earlier, a Canada-based company Grand Geo-Physical, had done the seismic survey to acquire aero-magnetic data between January and March.

Exploration by Cairn India Limited formally started in January with the launch of the aero magnetic survey. The exploration in the Gangetic basin comprising 13 districts will be spread over 15,500 sq km.