Asia's richest man entangled in India's import of Russian oil

US President Donald Trump has formally imposed an additional 25 per cent tariff on India for its imports from Russia, accusing New Delhi of helping to fund Moscow’s war in Ukraine. This move places India in the highest tier of tariffed nations so far.

India and Russia share a long-standing strategic partnership dating back to the Cold War, with Moscow serving as a key supplier of India’s defence arsenal. However, Trump’s criticism centers on the sharp rise in India’s oil imports from Russia since the invasion of Ukraine.

On August 19, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC that “some of the richest families in India” were the primary beneficiaries of these imports. Among them is Reliance Industries (RIL), India’s largest importer of Russian seaborne crude oil, led by Asia’s richest person, Mukesh Ambani.

Russian crude accounted for just 3 percent of RIL’s Jamnagar refinery imports in 2021. Since the war, that share has surged to an average of 50 percent in 2025, according to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), as cited by Al Jazeera. In the first seven months of 2025, Jamnagar imported 18.3 million tonnes of Russian crude—valued at $8.7 billion—a 64 percent year-on-year increase. These imports are only 12 percent below RIL’s total Russian oil imports for all of 2024.

Vaibhav Raghunandan, an EU-Russia analyst at CREA, said this shift was driven by the price cap on Russian oil products implemented on February 5, 2023. “The initial purpose of the price cap was to curtail Russian revenues, while also ensuring security of supply globally,” he said. “A lowered price cap is technically supposed to make this oil more attractive for countries like India and China but restrict Russian revenues.”

CREA’s data, shared with Al Jazeera, shows that Jamnagar exported $85.9 billion worth of refined products globally from February 2023 through July 2025. About 42 percent of those exports—worth $36 billion—went to countries sanctioning Russia. The European Union accounted for one-third of total exports, valued at $19.7 billion, while the US imported $6.3 billion worth of oil products, including an estimated $2.3 billion refined from Russian crude.

Rachel Ziemba, an adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, noted that India’s approach serves both economic and geopolitical goals. “It seems to me that even if most of the profits went to Reliance, the Indian government has found it convenient to continue this trade with Russia, both because the cheaper oil imports helped with India’s current account deficit and also helped send a message of non-alignment,” she said.

Trump’s tariffs signal mounting US frustration with India’s stance as it deepens economic ties with Moscow despite Western sanctions.

The Ambani name has recently been catapulted into international headlines when the youngest son of the family, Anant Ambani, tied the knot with his long-time girlfriend Radhika Merchant in one of the world’s most lavish weddings, reportedly spending over $600 million on the festivities.

 By Nazrin Sadigova