India-Russia bilateral trade augments tremendously

New Delhi: Union Ministry of Commerce informed that trade between India and Russia had increased significantly compared to last year. In the first five months of the financial year, the trade between the two countries crossed 18 billion dollars. India is buying large quantities of fuel and fertilizers from Russia. Therefore, it is said that such an increase has been recorded in this trade. While the Ministry of Commerce is providing this information, there are reports that Russia’s Gazprombank has opened an account with India’s UCO Bank. In the future, both countries will do business in Rupees and Rubles instead of dollars. Russia seems to have taken these steps for that.

Trade between India and Russia stood at $13.12 billion in the last five months in the previous financial year. But in the first five months of this financial year, this trade has reached the highest level and has gone up to $18.2 billion. The Ministry of Commerce released this data and gave information about this. After the conflict in Ukraine, the United States had started moves to prevent Russia from having the opportunity to sell fuel. But India, which buys 85 per cent of its fuel from the Gulf countries, accepted Russia’s proposal to supply fuel at a discounted rate. India did not care about the pressure put by the United States against this.

Due to this, India, which buys about one per cent of the country’s fuel demand from Russia, started buying a huge amount of fuel from Russia. Besides this, India also responded to the US pressure by increasing the purchase of fertilizers from Russia. It is said that India has decided to increase the purchase of coal and other products from Russia. While other major countries worldwide were succumbing to US pressure, Russian leaders were proud to say that India had proved its friendship with Russia by taking this decision. Also, India had prepared to trade in Rupees and Rubles so as not to be hampered by US sanctions in its trade with Russia.

Its results have been seen and Russia’s Gazprombank has opened an account with India’s UCO Bank. Due to this, the dollar will be removed from the transactions of both countries and both countries will get huge benefits. In particular, the dollars in India’s foreign reserves will be saved due to this and the international use of the rupee will be boosted. Other countries, including Russia, are also gearing up to do business with India in local currencies. This includes the Central Asian countries under Russian influence. Meanwhile, Iran is also said to have taken steps to do business with India on the lines of Russia by opening an account in India’s UCO Bank.

This cooperation between India and Russia will be vital in the future and will likely have great consequences at the economic and strategic levels. Increasing fuel purchases from Russia have further ensured India’s fuel security. Since Russia supplies fuel to India at discounted rates, India is benefiting in this transaction. Both countries will increase the scope of their trade in the future and are implementing projects for communication. Its results can also be seen in the near future.