India remains steadfast in the face of mounting accusations from the United States. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, back from the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in China, has made the ‘India Rising’ narrative even louder, highlighting the country’s independence on the global stage.
According to reports, he pointed to India’s robust 7.8% GDP growth in the first quarter of the financial year, even as the country faced escalating trade friction with the US.
At the same time, Donald Trump’s administration launched a series of sharp attacks against New Delhi, criticising PM Modi’s alignment with Russia and China, imposing steep tariffs, and accusing India of profiting from the war in Ukraine.
At the Semicon India Conference in Delhi, PM Modi said India’s economy had “outperformed every expectation, estimate and forecast.”
He pointed to broad-based growth across manufacturing, services, agriculture, and construction, saying, “While economies around the world are facing concerns and challenges driven by economic self-interest, India has achieved a growth rate of 7.8 per cent.” The figure surpassed the estimated 6.5% and marked the fastest growth in five quarters, compared to 6.5% in the April-June quarter last fiscal and 8.4% in January-March 2024.
“This growth is visible across all sectors… with enthusiasm evident everywhere,” he was quoted as saying.
India’s Prime Minister also countered Trump’s earlier remarks branding India a “dead economy,” declaring, “The day is not far when the world will say: Designed in India, made in India, trusted by the world.”
Meanwhile, Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro intensified criticism of India’s international alignments and trade practices. Referring to PM Modi’s appearance alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the SCO summit, Navarro reportedly said, “It is a shame” the Indian leader shared the stage with “the two biggest authoritarian dictators” in the world. He urged India’s Prime Minister to align with Europe and Ukraine, and to stop “buying oil from Russia.”
“So we hope that the Indian leader comes around to seeing that he needs to be with us in Europe and Ukraine and not with Russia on this, and he needs to stop buying the oil,” he told reporters.
The remarks followed a string of incendiary comments. Speaking to a reputed media house, Navarro said, “Look, Modi’s a great leader. I don’t understand why he’s getting into bed with Putin and Xi Jinping when he’s the biggest democracy in the world.
“So I would just simply say to the Indian people: please, understand what’s going on here. You’ve got Brahmins profiteering at the expense of the Indian people. We need that to stop. Yeah, and we’ll be watching that closely.”
Navarro has previously called the Russia-Ukraine war “Modi’s war,” accused India of fuelling the conflict for profit, and labelled the country “Kremlin’s laundromat.” “India, you’re the biggest democracy in the world, okay? Act like one… side with the democracies. (Instead) you’re getting in bed with the authoritarians,” he was quoted as saying, shortly after the US imposed 50% tariffs on Indian imports.
India has dismissed the tariffs as “unjustified and unreasonable.”
In a statement last month, the Ministry of External Affairs said, “The United States has in recent days targeted India’s oil imports from Russia. We have already made clear our position on these issues, including the fact that our imports are based on market factors and done with the overall objective of ensuring the energy security of 1.4 billion people of India.”
It added, “India will take all actions necessary to protect its national interests.”
For a background, Trump, who returned to office in January, imposed a 25% reciprocal tariff on Indian goods and an additional 25% penalty related to Russian oil purchases. He claimed India buys “most of its oil and military products” from Russia and “very little” from the US.
Speaking after Modi’s bilateral talks with Putin, Trump said India had now offered to reduce tariffs on US goods to “nothing,” but insisted it was “getting late.”
“What few people understand is that we do very little business with India, but they do a tremendous amount of business with us. In other words, they sell us massive amounts of goods, their biggest ‘client,’ but we sell them very little – until now a totally one-sided relationship, and it has been for many decades,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“The reason is that India has charged us, until now, such high Tariffs, the most of any country, that our businesses are unable to sell into India. It has been a totally one-sided disaster.”
“They have now offered to cut their Tariffs to nothing, but it’s getting late. They should have done so years ago. Just some simple facts for people to ponder,” he added.
Meanwhile, in a significant legal development, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled on Friday that most of Trump’s sweeping global tariffs are unlawful.
Following this, Democrats on the House Foreign Affairs Committee urged Speaker Mike Johnson to bring to the floor Representative Gregory Meeks’ resolution to terminate Trump’s “national emergency” declaration, which served as the basis for the tariffs.
Citing Meeks in a social media post, they called on Johnson to “stop covering for Trump’s lawlessness.”
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