New Delhi, March 3: India is in a reasonably comfortable position as far as crude oil, LPG and LNG are concerned, with a stock of 25 days of reserve for crude and 25 days of products, including the quantity that is in transit on ships headed for the country’s ports, according to government sources.
India imports over 85 per cent of its crude oil requirement, of which around 50 per cent is supplied by Middle Eastern countries through the Strait of Hormuz, flows from which has been disrupted following the Iran war.
However, India has diversified its oil sources by increasing imports from Africa, Russia, and the US and building resilience through strategic reserves. An official said that the country’s oil marketing companies (Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum) have supplies for several weeks and continue to receive energy supplies from several routes.
In addition, the government has directed the oil marketing companies not to export petroleum products so that the buffer stock is further enhanced. India has strengthened its energy security by diversifying its oil imports to countries outside the Gulf in the past few years, and a large volume of supplies does not come through the Strait of Hormuz now, a senior official said.
India has oil storage capacity at Pudur of 2.25 million metric tonnes (MMT), the Visakhaptnam facility has the capacity to store 1.33 MMT of crude oil, while Mangaluru has a storage capacity of 1.5 MMT. Besides, another strategic reserve facility is being built at Chandikhol, which is also on the sea coast.
The country can fall back on these strategic oil reserves in times of emergency. These reserves can also be dipped into at times when global prices skyrocket to provide a cushion to the national oil companies. However, the immediate impact will be on prices.
Brent, the global benchmark, crossed $80 per barrel, roughly 10 per cent more since the Iran crisis. The surge in oil prices leads to an increase in India’s oil import bill and pushes up the rate of inflation, which hurts economic growth. The country spent $137 billion on crude oil imports in the financial year ended March 31, 2025. During April 2025 to January 2026 – first ten months of the current financial year, as much as $100.4 billion was spent on the import of 206.3 million tonnes of crude oil.
IANS
