Pressmediaofindia
Related Articles
12-11-2024
NEW DELHI: Global oil prices “would have hit the roof” if big importer India had not bought oil from Russia following the Ukraine war, India’s oil minister said, adding that prices would determine where the country buys oil from.
India, the world’s third largest oil importer and consumer, has become the top buyer of discounted Russian sea-borne oil shunned by Western countries since Ukraine’s invasion began in early 2022. Before that, India bought little oil from its long-running defence partner, Russia.
New Delhi has repeatedly defended its purchases from Russia as necessary to keep prices in check in the developing country of 1.42 billion people.
“What many around the world don’t seem to realize is that global oil prices would have hit the roof if India had not bought oil from Russia,” India’s oil minister, Hardeep Singh Puri, wrote on X late on Friday.
“We owe it to our citizens, India will buy oil from wherever our companies get the best rates.”
India’s crude oil imports from Russia rose by 11.7% to about 1.9 million barrels per day in September, accounting for about two-fifths of the South Asian nation’s overall crude imports in the month. Russia was followed by Iraq and Saudi Arabia as India’s biggest suppliers.
India’s crude oil imports from Russia rose by 11.7% to about 1.9 million barrels per day (bpd) in September, accounting for about two-fifths of the South Asian nation’s overall crude imports in the month, tanker data obtained from industry sources showed.
Overall, refiners in India imported a total of 4.7 million bpd of crude oil in September, marginally higher than in August and about 8.5% more than the same month a year ago, the data showed.
The refiners have invested billions of dollars in plant upgrades, allowing them to process more crude grades, in an effort to reduce costs.
India, the world’s third largest oil importer and consumer, has emerged as the top buyer of discounted Russian seaborne oil after Western nations stopped buying from Moscow following its invasion of Ukraine.
Crude from the Commonwealth of Independent States, comprising Russia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, accounted for about 43% of India’s overall imports, up from 38.5% in August, the data showed.
During April-September, the first six months of the fiscal year to March 2025, India’s imports of Russian oil rose 9.1% to 1.91 million bpd, the data showed.
Russia remained India’s top oil supplier in September, followed by Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Russian oil imports were more than double Iraq’s 867,600 bpd, the data showed.
India also resumed its imports of Venezuelan oil in September after a gap of two months, with private refiner Reliance Industries Ltd (RELI.NS), opens new tab receiving a cargo, the data showed.
The market share accounted for by producers from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), mainly from the Middle East and Africa, declined marginally between April and September from the same period a year ago, an analysis of the data showed.
Imports from the Middle East fell to about a 41.6% share in April-September from 43.8% a year earlier, the data showed. Indian refiners mostly buy Middle Eastern oil under annual contracts with producers in the region.
