'Answerable only to our people': Sitharaman on question about India's fuel imports from Russia
Apr 23, 2023
Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], April 23 : India's top priority is to provide fuel to its people at an affordable price and it has fulfilled its duty during the latest volatility in global energy prices after the start of the Russia-Ukraine conflict last year, said Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
Global crude oil prices soared last year after the conflict between the two countries broke out in February 2022.
"For me, the question is we need to get it at an affordable price. My search will be constantly on where I can get it at affordable prices for Indians. And we explained our position. We are answerable as a sovereign country only to our people. We ensured that India will get the required fuel quantities at an affordable price," Sitharaman said while addressing an interactive programme organised by Thinkers Forum in Bengaluru.
Notably, India's fuel imports from Russia rose substantially over the past several months.
"Initially, everybody was asking how are you importing it (fuel) from Russia (or is it) because it is giving concession," Sitharaman said, reiterating India's position it was accountable to its people.
Sitharaman said India now has a visionary prime minister who himself monitors everything from Covid vaccines to the price of imported commodities.
She further noted India today is being observed by the global community for the way it steered its own way through the pandemic and the price hikes in various commodities due to war.
Further, on India's inflation, she said it was largely due to a hike cost of imported goods.
In India, headline consumer price index-based (CPI) inflation (or retail inflation) has now gradually declined from its peak of 7.8 per cent in April 2022 to 5.7 per cent in March 2023 and is projected to ease further to 5.2 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2023-24 financial year.
India's retail inflation was above RBI's 6 per cent target for three consecutive quarters and had managed to fall back to the RBI's comfort zone only in November 2022. Again in January and February, it breached 6 per cent. In March, it, however, came at 5.66 per cent in March 2023.
RBI has so far raised the repo rate, the rate at which it lends to banks, by 250 basis points cumulatively since May 2022 in the fight against inflation.
Raising interest rates is a monetary policy instrument that typically helps suppress demand in the economy, thereby helping the inflation rate decline and vice versa.
