India, Russia and Europe

The first principle

India deals with Russia and with Europe for different reasons, and it refuses to choose between them. Russia gives India what a rising power under pressure needs most: weapons, energy, nuclear cooperation and a veto holder that has long shielded India on Kashmir in the Security Council. Europe gives India what a growing economy needs most: markets, capital, technology and partners in setting global rules. Strategic autonomy means keeping both relationships whole even when the two sides are at war with each other, and this note is about how India does that and what it costs.

The core

India and Russia: what the relationship rests on

• A treaty born in crisis. The Indo Soviet Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation (August 1971) was signed months before the Bangladesh war, and Soviet vetoes in the United Nations (UN) Security Council protected India that December.
• A partnership raised step by step. The Declaration on Strategic Partnership (October 2000) began annual summits between the Prime Minister and the Russian President. In December 2010 the ties were raised to a Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership, and a ministerial 2+2 dialogue of foreign and defence ministers began in 2021. The twenty second annual summit was held in Moscow in July 2024.
• Defence as the core. Russia built much of India's armed forces: the Su 30MKI fighters made under licence by Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), T 90 tanks, the aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya and the S 400 air defence system bought in 2018. Joint production is the newer pattern, as in BrahMos (a joint venture of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Russia's NPO Mashinostroyeniya, set up in 1998) and AK 203 rifles made at Korwa in Amethi.
• Nuclear and space. Russia is building the Kudankulam nuclear power plant in Tamil Nadu, with two Russian designed pressurised water reactors running and more under construction, and it trained Indian astronauts for the Gaganyaan programme.

Energy and connectivity after 2022

• Discounted crude. Before the Ukraine war Russia supplied only a small share of India's crude oil. After Western sanctions in 2022, Russian crude was sold at a discount and Russia became India's largest crude supplier, which pushed bilateral trade above 65 billion US dollars in 2023 to 24 but left India with a very large trade deficit.
• The payment problem. Sanctions cut many Russian banks off from the dollar system, so in July 2022 the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) allowed trade to be settled in rupees through special vostro accounts. Russia built up rupees it could not easily spend, and part of the trade moved to other currencies such as the dirham of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
• Corridors. The International North South Transport Corridor (INSTC), agreed by India, Iran and Russia in 2000, links Mumbai to Russia through Iran and the Caspian Sea and is meant to be cheaper and quicker than the Suez route. The Chennai Vladivostok Eastern Maritime Corridor, agreed in 2019, links Indian ports to the Russian Far East.

India and Europe: what the relationship rests on

• The European Union (EU). India and the EU have held summits since 2000 and became strategic partners in 2004. A Trade and Technology Council (TTC), announced in April 2022, covers digital technology, clean energy and resilient supply chains; it is India's first such council with any partner, and the EU's second after the one with the United States (US). Negotiations on a Free Trade Agreement (FTA), suspended in 2013, were relaunched in June 2022 along with separate talks on investment protection and geographical indications.
• Trade agreements with the rest of Europe. The India European Free Trade Association (EFTA) Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement (TEPA), signed in March 2024 with Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein, came into force in October 2025 and carries an EFTA aim of 100 billion US dollars of investment in India over fifteen years. The India United Kingdom (UK) Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) was signed in July 2025.
• France. France became India's first strategic partner in 1998, the year of India's nuclear tests, when most Western countries imposed sanctions. Defence ties include Rafale fighters and six Scorpene (Kalvari class) submarines built at Mazagon Dock, and the Horizon 2047 roadmap (July 2023) sets goals in defence, space, nuclear energy and the Indo Pacific. Together they founded the International Solar Alliance in 2015.
• Germany and the Nordic states. Germany, the EU's largest economy, holds intergovernmental consultations with India and signed a Green and Sustainable Development Partnership and a Migration and Mobility Partnership in 2022. India Nordic summits (2018 and 2022) focus on green technology and innovation.

Dimensions

The Ukraine war and India's position

• Diplomatic. India abstained on the UN General Assembly and Security Council resolutions that condemned Russia in 2022, while stressing the UN Charter, territorial integrity and sovereignty of states. At the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Samarkand in September 2022 the Prime Minister told President Putin that "today's era is not of war", a line echoed in the Group of Twenty (G20) Bali declaration, and in August 2024 he became the first Indian Prime Minister to visit independent Ukraine.
• Economic. The war raised the price of fuel, fertiliser and edible oil for India, and India gained from discounted crude. In August 2025 the US imposed an additional tariff of 25 per cent on Indian goods, on top of a 25 per cent tariff imposed earlier that month, citing these purchases, which showed how the war can be turned into pressure on India.
• Security. Russia's growing dependence on China, which declared a "no limits" partnership with it in February 2022, is India's deepest worry, since China is India's main security challenge. War time demand inside Russia has also delayed some spare parts and deliveries, and the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) found that Russia's share of India's arms imports fell to 36 per cent in 2019 to 23, from a large majority a decade earlier.
• India's stake in peace. Peace would steady energy and food prices, ease sanctions risk on Indian firms, slow Russia's drift towards China and remove a wedge between India and the West, which is why India keeps channels open to both sides.

Does a stronger NATO and a closer US and Europe work for India?

• The expansion. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) admitted Finland (April 2023) and Sweden (March 2024) after the invasion of Ukraine, and its 2022 Strategic Concept for the first time described China as a challenge to its interests.
• Arguments that it helps India. A united West that deters territorial revisionism in Europe also upholds the principle India invokes against China on the Line of Actual Control. A NATO that names China as a challenge brings Europe closer to India's view of the Indo Pacific.
• Arguments that it hurts India. A cornered Russia leans further on China. A long war ties American money and attention to Europe rather than the Indo Pacific, and sanctions raise costs and risks for India's oil, defence and banking links with Russia. India's view is that a strong West helps only if it does not force India to drop its own partners.

In practice

• Rupee and diversified trade. India and Russia have set a target of 100 billion US dollars of trade by 2030, which can only be met if India sells more to Russia.
• Defence diversification. India now buys from France, the US and Israel as well as Russia, and pushes co production at home. The S 400 was used to intercept Pakistani drones and missiles during Operation Sindoor in May 2025, which showed that Russian systems remain central even as the share of new purchases falls.
• Frictions with Europe. The EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) charges importers for the carbon in steel, aluminium, cement, fertilisers, electricity and hydrogen; its reporting phase began in October 2023 and the charge phase in 2026, which hits India's steel and aluminium exports. The EU Deforestation Regulation will require proof that goods such as coffee, rubber, leather and wood did not come from deforested land, and India sees both measures as unilateral trade barriers in a climate guise.
• India Middle East Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC). Agreed at the G20 summit in New Delhi in September 2023 by India, the US, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, the EU, France, Germany and Italy, it would link India to Europe through the Gulf by sea and rail (see the note on West Asia).

Issues and way forward

• Over dependence on Russian arms. Spares, upgrades and payments are hostage to sanctions, and the answer is steady diversification and joint production in India under Make in India, without walking away from a partner whose platforms India will fly for decades.
• A trade relationship built on one product. Oil dominates trade with Russia, so it swings with discounts and sanctions. India should push exports of pharmaceuticals, machinery and farm goods and make the INSTC and the Eastern Maritime Corridor commercially viable.
• The China factor. India cannot stop Russia's tilt towards China, but summits, co production and investment in the Russian Far East give Russia reasons to keep India as a balancing partner.
• Unfinished business with Europe. Trade talks have long been slowed by differences on market access, data, labour mobility, carbon rules and intellectual property. India should seek recognition of its own carbon pricing under CBAM, longer timelines for small exporters, and mobility pacts like the German one as part of every trade deal.

Common confusions

• Strategic partnership and alliance. A strategic partnership is long term cooperation across many fields without a mutual defence obligation. India has strategic partnerships with Russia, France and the EU but no alliance with any of them.
• The 1971 treaty and a military pact. The Indo Soviet Treaty promised consultation if either side was attacked, not automatic military help, so it did not breach non alignment.
• EU and EFTA. The EU is a customs union of twenty seven members negotiating its own FTA with India; EFTA is a separate group of four countries outside the EU, whose TEPA is the first Indian trade deal to carry a commitment on investment.
• CBAM and a tariff. CBAM is a charge on embedded carbon, levied at the same rate as the EU's own carbon price, and is reduced by any carbon price already paid abroad; India's objection is that it ignores the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.

For the exam

• Keyword bank: Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership, Indo Soviet Treaty 1971, annual summit, S 400, BrahMos, discounted crude, rupee settlement, INSTC, Eastern Maritime Corridor, "not an era of war", strategic autonomy, Trade and Technology Council, EFTA TEPA, Horizon 2047, NATO expansion, CBAM.
• Practise the previous year questions on this topic →
• Use in an answer:
  • Introduction with data: "Russia went from a minor supplier to India's largest source of crude oil within two years of the Ukraine war, while its share of India's arms imports fell to 36 per cent in 2019 to 23 (SIPRI), which shows a partnership changing in content but not in importance."
  • Introduction with a quote: "'Today's era is not of war,' the Prime Minister told President Putin at Samarkand in 2022, a line that captures India's refusal to either condemn or endorse Russia."
  • Conclusion: "India's ties with Russia and Europe are not a choice between two camps but two halves of one strategy, with Russia supplying security and energy and Europe supplying markets, capital and technology."
  • Conclusion: "The test of strategic autonomy is whether India can keep both relationships whole while the two sides are in conflict, and so far it has done so at a manageable cost."