Gulf's upper hand slips as Russian oil import to India increases; Russia joins another Western country in first-month estimates for 2023

The country's import figures for last month came in response to those who argued that India is keeping close ties with the Gulf countries for the sake of oil. India's Russian oil imports hit a record high in January. India bought 1.4 million barrels of crude from Russia last month. Imports of Russian oil increased by 9.2 percent compared to December.

About 27 percent of crude oil imports come from Russia. Iraq and Saudi Arabia are right behind. India's oil imports are high in December and January every year. This is to avoid maintenance shutdown. Earlier, Indian companies were reluctant to buy Russian oil due to the high cost of transportation. But after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, this situation changed. The reason is that India started getting oil at a massive discount after Western countries avoided Russia.

Meanwhile, India's oil imports from Canada have also increased. According to the data, Canada has become the fifth largest oil supplier to India after the UAE. Reliance buys large quantities of oil from Canada. Iraq was the largest exporter of oil to India in the first ten months of this financial year. During this period, Russia took second place by overtaking second-placed Saudi Arabia. This has now reached the number one position.