Rubio will arrive in India on Sunday from Samarkand, Uzbekistan, where he has been meeting representatives of five Central Asian states at the C5+1 summit. On Monday, he is scheduled to meet Jaishankar in Mumbai, India’s financial hub, before travelling to Jamnagar in Gujarat to visit an oil refinery, according to a statement from the US Department of State.
The itinerary has drawn political attention after US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor said Washington expected Jaishankar and other officials from New Delhi to travel to Mumbai to meet Rubio. Opposition leaders have questioned the diplomatic optics of the arrangement, particularly as bilateral relations remain strained over trade, tariffs and India’s purchases of Russian oil.
Rubio’s visit is officially focused on trade, energy and investment. The US Department of State said he would meet senior Indian officials to discuss the strategic partnership and energy cooperation, as well as hold discussions with business leaders. Indian Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal appeared to confirm the agenda on Friday, saying the Mumbai talks would cover energy, trade and investment, defence, and critical and emerging technologies.
In Jamnagar, Rubio is scheduled to visit the world’s largest single-site refinery, operated by billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries, and attend a reception hosted by the Ambani family, according to The Hindu newspaper.
The choice of Jamnagar as the second stop has added significance because the city is one of the world’s major energy hubs. The US administration has framed the visit around energy and investment, while rising fuel prices in the United States have become a concern ahead of next month’s midterm elections.
Reliance, a conglomerate with interests in energy, retail and telecommunications, is also central to Washington’s wider oil diplomacy. Business Standard reported that the Jamnagar visit was significant because Reliance is the biggest buyer of Venezuelan crude oil besides the United States, at a time when Washington has been urging India to purchase more of the commodity.
Since US forces seized Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in January and took essential control of the country’s oil industry, the US government has marketed Venezuelan oil to international buyers.
Reliance is also investing in a new refinery in Texas, the first to be built in the United States in 50 years. Business Standard reported that US President Donald Trump described the project as a $300bn deal when he announced it in March.
Rubio’s planned meetings in Mumbai have also revived questions about the diplomatic significance of his decision not to visit New Delhi. He was last in the Indian capital in May for a meeting of foreign ministers from the Quad, which comprises the United States, India, Japan and Australia.
The controversy intensified on Thursday when Ambassador Sergio Gor spoke at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in New Delhi. Gor said Rubio would meet Indian government officials in Mumbai and that Washington “expected” Jaishankar and others from New Delhi to travel there to meet him.
Earlier in the week, however, Jaiswal had not confirmed Rubio’s visit or explained why the US secretary of state was skipping New Delhi. According to The Hindu, he told reporters that the Indian government would announce the visit “at the appropriate time”.
The ambassador’s remarks prompted criticism from the opposition Indian National Congress. Jairam Ramesh, a general secretary of the party, described Gor’s statement as “quite extraordinary” in a post on X.
Rahul Gandhi, the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, also commented on the issue on X on Friday, writing that Rubio had “summoned his employee to Mumbai”.
Congress MP Pawan Khera criticised the arrangement in stronger terms. “A foreign government summoning India’s External Affairs Minister on Indian soil is a new low, even by the Modi Government’s standards,” he wrote on X, referring to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The diplomatic row comes against the backdrop of prolonged trade negotiations between Washington and New Delhi. In August last year, after a round of trade talks broke down, the United States imposed a 50 percent tariff on most Indian goods. Under a framework agreed by the two countries in February, the rate was reduced to 18 percent. Negotiations have since stalled.
This month, Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the talks had “plateaued”, according to The Hindu. On Thursday, Trade Minister Piyush Goyal said the “first tranche” of a trade deal was in its final stages. However, he said India would not sign the agreement until its exporters had an advantage over competitors in countries such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Indonesia, according to Reuters.
Additional friction emerged last week when US Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling announced that his department was suspending eight companies, including Indian information technology giants Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro and HCL, from a labour certification scheme that is a key step for employers seeking green cards for foreign employees.
India’s purchases of Russian oil have further complicated relations. Sameer Lalwani, a senior fellow in the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote this week that Indian public opinion of the United States had fallen to a record low. He cited Washington’s engagement with Pakistan and the US-Israel war on Iran, which he said had pushed India back towards Russian oil.
Despite the political tensions, Lalwani argued that defence and technology cooperation between the two countries had quietly deepened. Bilateral trade also grew by almost 12 percent in 2025 to nearly $240bn. In his assessment, “perceptions of the political relationship have deteriorated faster than its strategic foundations.”
US Ambassador Sergio Gor has confirmed that Secretary of State Marco Rubio is skipping Delhi and has summoned EAM @DrSJaishankar to Mumbai instead. A foreign government summoning India’s External Affairs Minister on Indian soil is a new low, even by the Modi Government’s standards. It has left our own officials in the Ministry of External Affairs in a state of “utter bewilderment and disarray", as one of our birds in the Ministry tells us. Modi Ji, of course, will insist that 'All is Well.'
— Pawan Khera 🇮🇳 ಪವನ್ ಖೇರಾ (@Pawankhera) October 16, 2026
The possibility of additional US sanctions had threatened to deepen the dispute. Last month, Trump signed the Lindsey O Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, which could impose tariffs of up to 100 percent on goods from the five largest importers of Russian oil or gas.
India, one of the world’s biggest buyers of Russian oil, had warned Washington that further tariffs could damage bilateral relations. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order seeking to waive the sanctions as he attempts to ease high oil prices before the November 3 US elections.
Rubio’s India visit therefore comes at a sensitive point in bilateral relations, with trade negotiations stalled, energy policy remaining contentious and political criticism mounting over the arrangements for his meeting with Jaishankar. While the official agenda centres on strategic cooperation, energy and investment, the controversy surrounding the Mumbai talks has brought diplomatic protocol into focus alongside the broader economic and geopolitical issues facing both countries.
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