Russia and India have built a functioning payments infrastructure using the rupee and rouble, which now account for 96% of bilateral trade, a senior Russian banker said on Wednesday, news agency Reuters reported.
Russia’s trade with India reached a record $70 billion in 2024, tripling since the start of the conflict in Ukraine in 2022, as India increased imports of Russian oil discounted due to Western sanctions. Bilateral trade declined in 2025 after those sanctions were tightened but rebounded in the first half of 2026.
There are no problems with settlements between Russia and India. I am ready to say that this is one of the most reliable and best-established mechanisms for Russia’s payments with other countries,” said Ivan Nosov, head of Sberbank in India, reported news agency Reuters.
Russian businesses had earlier complained about an “overhang” of rupees, an only partially convertible currency, in bilateral transactions, along with trade imbalances as Indian exports to Russia lagged behind rising imports of Russian oil.According to official data, 22 Russian banks, including Sberbank, Russia’s largest lender, which was tasked with developing the payments infrastructure, and 17 Indian banks are currently servicing bilateral trade.Nosov said 90% of all transactions between Russia and India are processed within 10 minutes, while more than 50% are processed in less than one minute.Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi hailed growing economic ties with Russia when he met President Vladimir Putin on Monday.
