Reliance Industries' Jamnagar refinery increased Russian crude share from 3 percent in 2021 to about 50 percent in 2025, driving imports worth $8.7 billion in the first seven months of 2025. The refinery imported 18.3 million tonnes of Russian crude in that period, a 64 percent year-on-year increase. The surge followed the February 5, 2023 price cap on Russian oil products and has drawn US attention, including a 25 percent tariff on Indian imports from Russia and comments that wealthy Indian families benefited. Russia remains a major defence supplier and long-term strategic partner of India.
India was Russia's largest buyer of ENERGY, along with China, at a time when everyone wants Russia to STOP THE KILLING IN UKRAINE ALL THINGS NOT GOOD! Trump posted on his Truth Social platform on July 30. On August 19, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC that some of the richest families in India were the biggest beneficiaries of these imports.
The biggest importer in India of Russian crude oil has been Reliance Industries (RIL), which is led by Asia's richest person, Mukesh Ambani. Russian crude comprised a mere 3 percent of RIL's Jamnagar refinery's total crude imports in 2021. Since the war in Ukraine, it has shot up to an average of 50 percent in 2025, according to data from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) in Amsterdam.
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