New Delhi: Opposition parties on Friday accused the government of ceding diplomatic space after the US announced a temporary waiver to allow Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil, a step that the ruling BJP hailed as a success of “strategic oil diplomacy” under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi alleged that India’s foreign policy was a result of the “exploitation of a compromised individual”, an attack on Prime Minister Modi.
The Congress and its president Mallikarjun Kharge echoed the sentiment in separate social media posts hitting out at the government on its foreign policy and for “continuously ceding diplomatic space”.
“India’s foreign policy emerges from the collective will of our people. It should be rooted in our history, our geography, and our spiritual ethos based on Satya and Ahimsa,” Gandhi said in a post on X.
“What we are witnessing today is not policy. It is the result of the exploitation of a compromised individual,” he said.
Gandhi shared his February 11 speech in the Lok Sabha during the discussion on the budget where he spoke about India’s energy security being compromised.
Dismissing the Opposition’s charges, the government said India never depended on permission from any country to buy Russian oil and the US waiver removed friction but did not define the country’s policy, which was determined by the energy trilemma: affordability, availability, sustainability.
The message from the government to every Indian household was clear that the country’s fuel supply was fully secure and the the government was continuously monitoring the situation and would act, as it always had, in the interest of every citizen, a senior government functionary said.
The BJP accused the Congress and Gandhi of creating panic by spreading “fake news” about oil shortage.
“Rahul Gandhi and Congress hate seeing India act with strategic restraint and strategic clarity under Prime Minister Narendra Modi,” BJP national spokesperson Pradeep Bhandari said in a post on X.
“Yet again India’s strategic oil diplomacy under PM Narendra Modi succeeds!,” the BJP spokesperson added.
“A big egg on the face of anti-India Rahul Gandhi and Congress, which wanted to create panic by spreading fake news on ‘oil shortage’,” he said.
As the conflict in West Asia escalated, the US said it was issuing a temporary 30-day waiver to allow Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the “deliberately short-term measure” would not provide significant financial benefit to the Russian government as it only authorised transactions involving oil already stranded at sea.
Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that it was “outrageous” that India should appear to require US approval for decisions such as imports.
India’s sovereignty was not subject to foreign “clearance”, Vijayan said on X.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin said when the United States decided to allow India to purchase Russian oil for just 30 days, it raised a fundamental question: “Why should India need another country’s approval to secure its own energy needs?”
“India’s dignity in the international arena needs to be protected and the nation’s sovereignty and interests need to be defended,” he said on X.
Kharge alleged in his post that India’s strategic autonomy and national sovereignty were under dire threat “because PM Modi is getting blackmailed on Epstein Files and Adani Case”.
“The US proclamation to ‘allow’ and grant us ‘permission’ to buy Russian oil, as a ‘waiver for 30 days’ clearly demonstrates Modi Government is continuously ceding diplomatic space.
“‘Main Desh Nahi Jhukne Doonga’ was a mere slogan-cry to win elections. 140 Crore Indians stand betrayed. Modi ji SURRENDERED it all,” Kharge alleged.
In a post in Hindi on X, Congress general secretary in-charge of communications Jairam Ramesh said, “Trump ka naya khel, Dilli dost ko kaha, Putin se le sakte ho tel, kab tak chalega ye Ameriki blackmail (Trump’s new game; told his friend in Delhi you can get oil from Russian President Vladimir Putin; how long will this American blackmail continue)?”
The Congress’s media and publicity department head Pawan Khera said Gandhi’s words had proved prophetic that the US would decide from whom “we should be purchasing oil” and asked, “Will the US grant us a licence for importing oil?”
Last month, the US and India announced that they had prepared a framework for an interim agreement on trade, and Trump issued an executive order removing the 25 per cent tariffs slapped on New Delhi, taking note of the latter’s commitment to stop importing oil from Moscow and increase purchases of American energy products.
Left leaders questioned the Centre over the US announcement of a waiver to Indian refiners, terming it a “humiliation” of sovereign India. CPI MP P Santhosh Kumar in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India’s foreign policy appeared to have “drifted away from its foundational principles of non-alignment”.
He said at a time when the war against Iran by the US and Israel threatened to embroil West Asia into a wider and dangerous conflict, many across India were concerned that the country’s foreign policy posture appeared to have drifted away from the principles of non-alignment, strategic autonomy and respect for sovereignty.
CPI(M) Rajya Sabha MP John Brittas said on X, “US ‘grants’ India a 30-day waiver to buy stranded Russian oil amid Middle East chaos? Is this ‘facilitation’ or pure humiliation for a sovereign nation like India?”
PTI
