Opposition parties launched an attack on the Centre after the US announced a temporary waiver to allow Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil and asked if New Delhi needed Washington's "permission", drawing the BJP's sharp rebuttal.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent this morning said the US is issuing a temporary 30-day waiver to allow Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil amid a raging war in the Middle East that has hit the global supply.
"'Issuing a 30 day waiver' - The sanctimonious language of condenscation drips with neo-imperial arrogance. Are we a banana republic that we need the permission of the US to secure our energy security imperatives?" Congress MP Manish Tewari posted on X.
"The silence of an otherwise overly loquacious government is deafening. Does it not understand what sovereignty means?" the former Union Minister asked.
His party colleague Karti P Chidambaram also asked how the US can "allow" New Delhi to buy the Russian oil.
"What a disgrace to our sovereignty," he said.
Aam Aadmi Party's Arvind Kejriwal also asked who was "America to grant India permission".
BJP's Praveen Khandelwal said it was the Opposition's "political tactics".
"Our government has very transparently presented the actual situation regarding oil to the entire country. But the irony with the Congress and other opposition parties is that they do not trust their own government, yet they place greater trust in whatever any random person says," he said.
"This is just one of their political tactics because they are continuously losing elections and becoming irrelevant in politics," he said.
India Gets 30-Day Waiver From US To Buy Russian Oil Amid Iran War
Scott Bessent said the US Treasury Department was issuing a 30-day waiver to Indian refiners to enable oil to keep flowing into the global market.
"This deliberately short-term measure will not provide significant financial benefit to the Russian government as it only authorizes transactions involving oil already stranded at sea," he wrote on X.
"India is an essential partner of the United States, and we fully anticipate that New Delhi will ramp up purchases of US oil. This stop-gap measure will alleviate pressure caused by Iran's attempt to take global energy hostage," he said.
US President Donald Trump had last year slapped India with 25 per cent tariffs for buying Russian oil. His administration had claimed that it was "fuelling" Russia's war against Ukraine.
Washington had also made reducing purchases from Moscow a key condition in the India-US interim tariff framework agreement announced last month. The Trump administration had also agreed to waive the 25 per cent tariffs on assurances New Delhi will scale back Russian purchases.
