India will always buy crude oil from Venezuela as long as it is permitted to, Union oil minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Friday.
“We always buy from Venezuela. It’s when Venezuela came under sanctions that they were not able to supply,” Puri said.
In 2019-20, the country had imported 6.03 billion worth of petroleum oil from Venezuela which made up 99.5% of India’s total imports from the country.
Puri’s comments come after the US eased sanctions on Venezuelan oil in October.
The minister also said that many Indian refineries can use heavy Venezuelan oil.
“We are in a situation where we are utilising 5 million barrels of crude oil in a day.
“And our growth is going up. So if Venezuelan oil comes on the market, we welcome it,” the minister said.
According to reports, at least three Indian refiners — Reliance Industries (RIL), Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), and HPCL-Mittal Energy (HMEL) — have booked Venezuelan oil cargoes, which are expected to land in India over the next couple of months.
Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL) is also looking to start imports of Venezuelan crude.
India is the world’s third-largest consumer of crude oil and depends on imports to meet over 85% of its requirement.