India’s economic growth for the 2026/2027 fiscal year could be lower than previously expected amid higher oil prices with the re-escalation of the Middle East war and the El Nino weather phenomenon, a senior official at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) told Reuters. “The downside risks are probably twofold,” Ranil Salgado, the IMF’s resident representative for India and Bhutan, told Reuters in an interview published on Tuesday. “One is that the war is already starting to expand again, and that has implications for oil prices,” the official said, adding that the other risk was El Nino, which could lead to a poor monsoon. The renewed closure of the Strait of Hormuz and the escalation of hostilities in the region hiked oil prices by 16% in one week to nearly $90 per barrel Brent. India, which imports more than 85% of the oil it consumes, received about half of all its imports from the Middle East before the war.