India may announce a payment arrangement that would allow it to trade with Russia using local currencies—the rupee and the ruble—according to A. Sakthivel, the president of the Federation of Indian Export Organizations (FIEO).
Such a proposed rupee-ruble method would allow India to continue trade with Russia even as Western sanctions have disrupted international payment mechanisms.
International sanctions slapped on Russia also offer India an opportunity to expand into the Russian market, he added.
“Export to Russia is not much, only in agriculture and pharmacy products. Now that the whole of the West is banning Russia, there will be a lot of opportunities for Indian firms to enter Russia,” Sakthivel said.
FIEO is a government-backed association that represents more than 200,000 exporters. India exported $3.3 billion worth of goods to Russia last year and imported $6.9 billion in return.
India’s attempt to try and set up a rupee-ruble trade mechanism would upset the West as it will dilute the effect of sanctions. However, Sakthivel expects the Indian government to handle the issue “very carefully” after taking into account “all the factors.”
India, the world’s largest democracy, has taken a neutral stand on Russia’s war against Ukraine.
Both the United States and the United Kingdom have criticized India for continuing to import Russian crude oil.
New Delhi has defended its actions.
India buys “very little oil” from Russia, which accounts for less than one percent of the country’s imports, External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar told the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of India, on March 24.
Meanwhile, India has also officially dismissed the idea of a possible rupee trade on Russian oil.
When questioned about India continuing to buy oil from Russia during a press briefing on March 18, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that though the United States has decided to ban Russian oil imports, “we recognize” that other countries have not taken such a decision.
“And they have different economic reasoning as to why different countries do, including some in Europe,” she said.