India's Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said he would "carefully" assess whether to support a G-7 proposal regarding imposing a price cap on Russian oil but his country does not face a moral conflict when it comes to buying it.
"There are many conversations going on due to a large number of factors," Puri told CNBC on Monday.
When asked if India would sign on to the G-7 proposal, Puri responded that the world was still adjusting to the impact of COVID-19 and Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
"Now, what will the proposal mean?" he asked. "We will look at it very carefully."
But despite the G-7's proposal, as Puri points out, India only makes up a small fraction of Russia's oil purchases.
"Today, our five million barrels of oil, where does it come from? Well, it comes largely from Saudi Arabia, from Abu Dhabi, from Kuwait; Iraq is actually our largest supplier ... Russia accounted, if memory serves me right, towards the end of the financial year, which ended 31 March 2022, 0.2%. Then when things started, somebody said, 'India's buying a lot of oil from Russia.' I said, 'the Europeans buy more in one afternoon than I buy in a quarter.'"
Additionally, according to the EU Observer on Monday, in regard to the European Union, it is unclear what a price cap on Russian oil will mean when "Russia, on Friday, said its Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany would remain closed indefinitely for maintenance."
Still, despite it all, Puri maintains that his country does not face a moral conflict when it comes to buying Russian oil.
"No, there's no conflict," Puri states. "I have a moral duty to my consumer. Do I, as a democratically elected government, want a situation where the petrol pump runs dry? Look at what is happening in countries around India."
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