New Delhi, Jan. 27 -- Rebalancing its oil import basket of the last three-four years, India is slowly yet surely moving away from the Russia Federation and turning back to its traditional crude oil suppliers in West Asia.

In doing so, Iraq, the no. 1 crude exporter to India from fiscal 2018 until FY2022 when the Ukraine war began, is back as a strong force in the Indian oil market and fast catching up with Russian supplies, latest data shows. Russian oil imports have been falling since recent US sanctions on two of its biggest exporters.

Iraq supplied 1.06 million barrels of oil daily (mbpd) in the first month of 2026 (until 20 January) as compared to 1.10 mbpd from Russia, according to Kpler, a market intelligence provider for commodit...