Why Trump’s attack on India’s energy imports from Russia is hypocritical

India has pushed back strongly to accusations  coming thick and fast from the United States that by buying copious amounts of Russian oil, it not only is funding Russia’s conflict with Ukraine, but is also raking billions of dollars for itself from this trade.

Following its puzzling allegations, the Trump administration  has imposed an additional 25 per cent tariff on Indian exports to the United States. In total Washington  has slammed India with 50 per cent duties on its US-bound products.

 The latest salvo against New Delhi was fired by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. In an interview with CNBC, the US official alleged  that India was engaging in what he described as "arbitrage". That meant that New Delhi was  buying discounted Russian crude, refining it into fuels, and reselling the products to Europe and other regions that have sanctioned Moscow.

"They are just profiteering. They are reselling," Bessent said. "They've made $16 billion in excess profits, some of the richest families in India." In calling out that India’s "richest families” of wrongdoing, Bessent was targeting Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani, whose giant refinery in the state of Gujarat was engaged in refining Russian crude destined for the world market.

In response to Washington’s unbridled pressure, the Modi administration in India has defiantly persisted with the purchases of Russian oil. It has also shown the mirror to the United States by pointing out that all its arguments to impose the Russian “oil tax” on India are  unreasonable, illogical, unfair and plain hypocritical.

During a recent visit to Moscow, India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar did not mince words when he said that New Delhi was “very perplexed” by the Trump administration’s move to load India with tariffs.

“We (India) are not the biggest purchasers of Russian oil, that is China. We are not the biggest purchasers of LNG, that is the European Union. We are not the country which has the biggest trade surge with Russia after 2022; I think there are some countries to the South. We are a country where the Americans have said for the last few years that we should do everything to stabilise the world energy market, including buying oil from Russia.” He added: “Incidentally, we also buy oil from the US, and that amount has increased. So honestly, we are very perplexed at the logic of the argument that you (the media) had referred to”.

So what is the real story of India’s oil purchases from Russia, and why are the Americans so miffed with Modi?

It is a fact that India has ramped up Russian crude imports after Moscow’s  armed conflict with Ukraine began in February 2022.

Kpler data shows that before the war, India bought only 68,000 barrels per day. That figure surged in May 2023, clocking a peak of 2.15 million barrels per day. It then settled down in July 2025 to a daily consumption of  1.78 million barrels. From a low of 0.2 per cent before the conflict, consumption has now surged to a high of around 36 per cent per day in July 2025.

Reliance Industries and Nayara Energy, nearly half-owned by Russia’s Roseneft, have starred in the booming India-Russia energy partnership.

It all began in  December 2024 when Ambani signed a deal with Russia's Rosneft to import up to 500,000 barrels of oil  per day. The 10 year contract was  worth around $12-13 billion annually.

Nayara Energy has also sharply raised its sourcing from Russia.  By 2025, nearly 72% of Nayara's crude came from Russia. In comparison, in 2022, Russian crude was only fulfilling 27 per cent of its requirements, Kpler data revealed

Indian state-run refiners such as Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Bharat Petroleum (BPCL), and Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL) have also bitten into Russian crude. However, their purchases have mainly gone for meeting India’s domestic demand, not exports. In contrast, private refiners–especially Reliance and Nayara energy– have been key in exporting refined fuel products to Europe and other markets.

 Bloomberg and Kpler data reveals that in FY 2024-25, these two refiners exported $60 billion worth of petroleum products to the European Union.

Nayara exported nearly 3 million metric tonnes of fuel in the first half of 2025– nearly 30% of its total output. The buyers included Vitol, Aramco Trading, Shell, and BP. In the same period Reliance exported over 21 million tonnes, supplying to oil majors such as BP, ExxonMobil, Glencore, Vitol, and Trafigura.

Data from India’s commerce ministry also mirrors how refined petroleum has become a major item of India’s export basket.

India exported petroleum products worth $97.47 billion in FY 2022-23, $84.16 billion in FY 2023-24, and $63.35 billion in FY 2024-25.

The main buyers included the Netherlands, the UAE, and Singapore, along with other destinations in  Europe and West Africa. 

During his Moscow press conference with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, Jaishankar did refer  to how the United States encouraged India to buy Russian crude. That story needs further elaboration.

 In an interview with CNBC, Bob McNally, a former White House official and president of Rapidan Energy has  pointed out that in 2022, Washington actually encouraged New Delhi to buy Russian oil after the Russia-Ukraine conflict broke out in 2022. 

"India played a key role in the price cap sanction mechanism designed by the U.S. and its European allies to ensure Russian oil still flowed while trying to crimp the revenue Moscow earned," he observed.

In November 2022, former US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, herself spilled the beans on how India was roped in to buy Russian oil to stabilise energy markets as the Europeans were reluctant to directly buy oil from Moscow because of the Ukraine conflict.

"The United States is happy for India to continue buying as much Russian oil as it wants, including at prices above a G7-imposed price cap mechanism, if it steers clear of Western insurance, finance and maritime services bound by the cap.”

It was evident that with India purchasing Russian crude and then exporting it to international destinations, Washington wanted to ensure that  international energy markets were not destabilised while it pursued sanctions against Moscow due to the Ukrainian conflict.

In February 2024, US Assistant Secretary of State Geoffrey Pyatt, patted India on the back for  stabilising global energy markets.  "India has played a key role in efforts to stabilise global energy markets through its purchases of Russian crude."

Former US Ambassador to India Eric Garcetti in May 2024 went further by confirming Washington’s  underlying policy of encouraging India to buy Russian oil.

“The US allowed the purchase to take place to ensure the prices did not go up globally," he observed. Garcetti spotlighted that due to this carefully crafted arrangement, global oil prices were kept in check and "India delivered on that."

So, if India and the US were working hand in glove, why did Trump suddenly wreck this cosy arrangement?

Credible reports are emerging that the India-US relations, once seen as strategic, went rapidly South after Trump claimed that he had prevented a full blown India-Pakistan war in May following the Kashmir terror strike in February.

The June 17 telephonic conversation between Modi and Trump that lasted 35 minutes was particularly damaging. During that call, Modi reportedly clarified that the ceasefire with Pakistan was negotiated directly through military channels, without any US involvement.

This contradicted Trump’s oft repeated public stance that he had brokered peace between India and Pakistan using trade leverage. For Trump, his narrative was significant for bolstering his credentials for a Nobel Peace Prize. Pakistan had already declared that Trump deserved a Nobel because of his intervention to engender a ceasefire between New Delhi and Islamabad.

The problem between Modi and Trump only aggravated after Trump reportedly invited Modi to the White House for a photo op with Pakistan’s Army Chief Asim Munir on his way back from the G-7 summit in Canada. Modi obviously declined the invite as the Indian security establishment believed that Munir was personally involved in the Kashmir carnage.

Following the call, Trump imposed a 50% tariff on Indian goods.