New Delhi: India and Venezuela have agreed to deepen their energy collaboration, with an Indian technical team set to travel to the South American nation soon to explore investment opportunities in its oil and gas sector, following a meeting between Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri and Venezuela's Acting President Delcy Eloína Rodríguez Gómez in New Delhi on June 4.
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Puri called on the Acting President along with senior officials of the ministry and the heads of India's energy sector public sector undertakings (PSUs). Both sides discussed building a longer-term energy partnership, the ministry said in a statement on Friday.
"Our technical team will visit Venezuela soon to further explore this potential," Puri said in a post on X after the meeting.
He added: "Indian companies already have existing investments in Venezuela and now look forward to building upon them, in addition to looking for newer opportunities for fruitful collaborations which will provide momentum to our quest towards energy security under the leadership of PM Sh Narendra Modi Ji."
Puri framed the relationship around a match between Venezuela's reserves and India's refining base. "Venezuela possesses biggest proven reserves of oil in the world, while India not only possesses huge demand for energy but also has the technological expertise and manpower to refine Venezuelan crude in our refineries," he said in the post.
The ministry statement similarly described Venezuela as a traditional supplier of crude to India and said the country's refining sector is "uniquely equipped to process Venezuela's heavy crude."
According to the ministry, India's average monthly crude imports from Venezuela rose from 64.027 thousand metric tonnes (TMT) during FY 2025-26 to 1,047.148 TMT in April–May of FY 2026-27 — an increase of more than 16 times. The statement said Venezuela was already among India's largest crude suppliers in April and May 2026, describing this as "a reflection of the future potential."
Indian PSUs have maintained a presence in Venezuela's upstream sector since 2008, the ministry said. India's total investment in the country's oil sector stands at approximately USD 1 billion across the San Cristóbal and Petrocarabobo-1 projects in the Orinoco Belt, according to the statement.
The Acting President welcomed Indian companies to participate in Venezuela's reformed oil and gas sector and invited an Indian delegation to visit the country to explore enhanced collaboration, the ministry said. She pointed to the complementarities between the two economies in energy, the statement said.
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Venezuelan crude flows to India had shrunk sharply in recent years under US sanctions on Caracas, and the renewed purchases come amid wider disruptions to crude supplies from the Gulf, according to industry reports. The ministry statement attributed the current engagement to India's "energy diversification strategy" following supply disruptions.