India’s federal Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said that India would buy oil from wherever it wants, and that the country has a moral obligation to supply oil to its citizens.
“India consumes five million barrels a day, and it’s going up. So no, we are not going to be told by anyone… that’s understood. If there is an issue of how one should deal with an evolving geo-political situation and which governments need to be involved in talks, those talks will take place,” Puri told, while addressing a group of reporters in Washington DC on Friday.
Last week, Federal Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that India’s crude oil imports from Russia have risen to 12 to 13 percent of all its fuel shipments from about 2 percent in February.
Western countries have imposed several trade sanctions on Russia and the US has made a particular point of urging India to restrict its oil imports from Russia to bring it in line with Washington’s sanctions.
Puri’s statement came days after the Saudi-led Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) announced that it intended to cut production by 2 million barrels per day starting in November.
