India’s expenditure on import has been 465.57 billion US dollars in 2017-18. Import bill is increasing year by year and in 2017-18 register a whopping 21.1% growth. In Financial year India spent 384.35 billion US dollar. Growth in import is mainly due to mineral fuel and oils. Crude oil price having upward trend and India spent 28.4% on this account.
Top slot in imported category is occupied by mineral fuels and India spent 132.29 billion US dollar. Minister of transport and highway is pitching for electric motor vehicles, It can be solution of curbing rising import due to crude oil. This category registered a 28% growth on account of surge in crude oil price and increasing domestic demand.
Also Read, Top 10 commodities exported by India in 2017-18
Second in the category is natural or cultured pearls, precious or semiprecious stones,pre metals ,clad with jewelry and coin. Indians are traditionally known for love for precious metals. This has caused to rise import of this category by whopping 39%.
Third slot is hold by electrical machinery & equipment, sound recorders, reproducers and television image. This category also register 25% growth, in 2016-17 38.5 billion us dollar to 48.2 Us dollar.
top 10 commodities imported by India 2017 18 in tabular form is listed here
All figures are in US million dollars
| s.no. | commodity | 2016-17 | %share | 2017-18 | %share | %growth |
| 1 | mineral fuels, mineral oils and products of their distillation; bituminous substances; mineral waxes. | 103163.2 | 26.8405 | 132294.5 | 28.4 | 28.2 |
| 2 | natural or cultured pearls,precious or semiprecious stones,pre.metals,clad with pre.metal and articles thereof; jewelry;coin. | 53767.4 | 13.9889 | 74710.4 | 16 | 39 |
| 3 | electrical machinery and equipment and parts thereof; sound recorders and reproducers, television image and sound recorders and reproducers,and parts. | 38570.6 | 10.0351 | 48269.2 | 10.4 | 25.2 |
| 4 | nuclear reactors, boilers, machinery and mechanical appliances; parts thereof. | 32089 | 8.3488 | 37824.3 | 8.1 | 17.9 |
| 5 | organic chemicals | 15477.1 | 4.0268 | 19201.3 | 4.1 | 24.1 |
| 6 | plastic and articles thereof. | 11568.5 | 3.0098 | 13926.9 | 3 | 20.4 |
| 7 | animal or vegetable fats and oils and their cleavage products; pre. edible fats; animal or vegetable waxes. | 10946.3 | 2.848 | 11700.4 | 2.5 | 6.9 |
| 8 | iron and steel | 8238.9 | 2.1435 | 10432.2 | 2.2 | 26.6 |
| 9 | optical, photographic cinematographic measuring, checking precision, medical or surgical inst. and apparatus parts and accessories thereof; | 7398.3 | 1.9249 | 8720 | 1.9 | 17.9 |
| 10 | aircraft, spacecraft, and parts thereof. | 8373 | 2.1784 | 7677.9 | 1.6 | -8.3 |
source Ministry of Commerce and Industry, India
