Is it true that India plans to buy crude oil from Russia?

That is the latest opportunity that India plans to capitalize on. IOCL recently placed a major order for crude from Russia and has assured that it will buy crude oil and other commodities from Russia. That is more because Russia is selling most of these assets at discount. However, due to the SWIFT restrictions on Russian businesses and the specific embargo, India can only start the trade once rupee-rouble transactions are enabled. That is underway.

India currently relies on Russia for just about 2-3% of its crude requirements and mostly gets its crude from the Middle East and Africa. However, with prices much lower than the market, India is expected to increase the Russia share if they get a decent price. Global traders have been avoiding Russian oil since it could entail American sanctions. With SWIFT restrictions, India will first need a rupee-rouble mechanism in place at the earliest.