India’s oil imports from the US jumped over 270 per cent year-on-year within the first 4 months of 2025, underscoring Delhi’s technique of enhancing American imports amid commerce pact negotiations and diversifying its sources of crude oil in a risky geopolitical and geo-economic surroundings.
Negotiations between India and the US for an interim commerce deal by July 9 have entered their last section.
In line with the newest accessible knowledge with the Directorate Basic of Industrial Intelligence and Statistics (DGCIS), India imported 6.31 million tonnes of US crude in January-April, sharply up from 1.69 million tonnes within the year-ago interval. With this, the US accounted for 7 per cent of India’s oil imports for January-April 2025, considerably increased than 2 per cent within the corresponding 4 months of 2024.
In worth phrases, India’s US crude imports within the first 4 months of the present calendar 12 months stood at $3.78 billion, a giant leap from round $ 1 billion within the year-ago interval. It’s value noting that not simply volumes, however oil worth fluctuations additionally play a vital function in figuring out the worth of imports.
India is stepping up imports from the US throughout classes to handle America’s key concern of a widening items commerce deficit. Underneath the probably commerce deal, India can be anticipated to open up its market to a spread of American items – from vehicles and defence tools to agricultural merchandise. Official knowledge present that whereas India’s general imports in April rose by solely 19 per cent, imports from the US jumped 63 per cent to $5.24 billion, up from $3.20 billion in April 2024. This rise in imports narrowed India’s items commerce surplus with the US to $3.1 billion, down from $3.4 billion.
Increasing vitality commerce with the US would, to an extent, allay Washington’s considerations in regards to the steadiness of commerce between the 2 international locations. Additionally, from a strategic and vitality safety perspective, stepping up purchases of American oil helps India with some leverage with different supplying nations, whose provide volumes could also be dented in consequence, in line with sources. The goal there could be to nudge them to supply oil to India at even higher costs in a bid to guard their market share.
Moreover, given the tensions in West Asia, sourcing oil from areas that may utterly bypass the area’s delivery routes is strategically essential for India, which is dependent upon imports to fulfill over 88 per cent of crude oil requirement. Excessive import dependency and rising vitality consumption make the nation a pretty marketplace for oil and fuel exporters.
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President Donald Trump has been eyeing rising vitality exports to India and in February, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the US, the President stated that India and the US had agreed to take steps in the direction of making Washington “a number one provider of oil and fuel to India”, which may assist bridge the commerce deficit between the 2 international locations. Trump stated that the US will “hopefully” be India’s prime oil and fuel provider.
The leap in general imports in April – probably signalling a broader pattern – was pushed by a pointy 270 per cent year-on-year improve in oil imports to three.56 million tonnes. In March, too, US oil imports surged 247 per cent year-on-year to 1.26 million tonnes. General, the share of US crude in India’s oil imports rose from 4.6 per cent in April 2024 to 12 per cent this 12 months. That’s increased than the 4.7 per cent recorded only a month earlier in March.
