Tariff As Regime-Change Tool

Extra 25 per cent tariff on Indian goods –– “sanctions” is the correct expression used by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt –– for buying Russian oil is the latest proof of the continuing bipartisan US efforts to enforce a regime change in India. Prime Minister Modi should go. Period. Otherwise, there is no need for all this fake outrage when it was the Biden administration that had “asked” India to buy Russian oil, when China remains the largest oil importer and the European Union the biggest Russian gas buyer. India is “perplexed”, as External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar put it, because other than a regime-change attempt there is no plausible reason for these “sanctions”.

Now is the time to look back at Pahalgam. Hindsight always offers a 20/20 vision. Did Pakistan’s tinpot army chief Asim Munir believe that he had US on his side when he sent terrorists across the LoC to carry out the worst communal attack on innocent tourists in recent times? Did Munir wargame a situation wherein, after Balakot, India was sure to have responded kinetically to a terrorist attack? Did he expect the US to jump in to protect Pakistan? The US did rush in to safeguard the nuclear arsenal and to seek a ceasefire. Then President Trump invited Munir for lunch, and again for CENTCOM chief Michael Kurrilla’s farewell.

All Indian domestic pressure points were being jabbed mercilessly: a Pakistani terror attack; retaliation being countered by US diplomacy; Americans hyphenating India and Pakistan; summoning Modi to the White House to have lunch with Munir; and letting Munir threaten India with a nuclear attack on American soil. Meanwhile, the Opposition, as if picking up the cue, began the chorus of “Narendar Surrender”. Tariff was the only quasi-legitimate weapon left for the US to unleash on Modi. Now, that is also done.

The Russian oil bogey is a diversionary tactic, and the so-called attack on Mukesh Ambani is laughable because he had a meeting with Trump at Doha in May, which was his second since January. The US would have beef about Russian-owned refiner Nayara Energy making a decent profit refining Russian crude, if at all. But the refining margins are legal and the very idea of de-legitimising these profits is an attempt to criminalise the Indian government in a grand attempt at regime change.

If India acquiesces, the Narendar-Surrender slogan will be raised and if India upholds its sovereignty, the government would be attacked for war profiteering –– a dirty accusation to be made against any government.

Indian policy makers ought to have taken a close look at a picture from the Oval Office where all the European heads of government were sitting studiously across the President’s table. They represent countries that were captured/liberated by the Allied forces at the end of World War II. UK PM Keir Starmer’s absence was significant. After all, the UK, unlike France, was not under Nazi occupation. It is the 1945 world order established by the Western winners of WWII that is at stake. India achieved its freedom fighting one of the biggest winners of WWII and obviously doesn’t belong to this group.

India’s success and its continuing growth story should be read against this backdrop. That Indian soldiers and resources helped UK retain its sovereignty and the fact that their sacrifices helped Allied forces in their crucial turnarounds like the Battle of Kohima are forgotten. In fact, they are remembered only while wargaming secessionist and separatist scenarios in India where the grandchildren of the “loyal collaborators” are expected to secede to become mercenaries all over again.

After all, America was built with British colonial loot. Where did the investible surplus that created the rail roads, canals, textile mills, steel factories and mining industry come from? Would America have industrialised so fast and so well without British capital? Utsa Patnaik, the Indian economist, had assessed the colonial plunder and arrived at the figure of $45 trillion –– some of it, obviously, would have got invested in creating the American miracle. Grownups know that there are no real miracles or magic, but only a sleight of hand. Without colonial or neocolonial pillage there is no Western magic.

So, the attack on Indian sovereignty is nobody’s eccentricity. It is rather a necessity for the West to have a pliant Indian leadership, which they were used to since the late 1980s. A single party rule with a strong leader in India thus becomes anathema to the West. It is interesting to note that the same geopolitical forces that were mobilised against Indira Gandhi are now trying to corner Modi. Of course, with the big difference of a reduced Russia and a rising China, which when combined would give the world a countervailing force against Western dominance. The Rupee-Rouble era is being revisited when Russia and India agree to increase bilateral trade in their sovereign currencies.

All that Modi lacks are the camaraderie of SA Dange and Mohit Sen and an alliance with the CPI. Jokes apart, the most astonishing diplomatic feat achieved by Modi is the recalibration, or rather total reversal, of India’s relationship with China in the face of domestic political heat. India’s animosity towards China was a Western construct that had to be demolished at some point in time. And Modi grabbed the opportunity delivered by the hostile West to swing towards China, proving true the old claim of India being a swing state.

The new dawn in Asia has been hastened by Western avarice. A Russia-India-China axis could stabilise global political and economic turbulence and create a more just world order. The Tianjin SCO summit, just a few days away, holds much in store for India, which needs predictable borders on the north and east, and trade routes to east. The Chennai-Vladivostok Sea link revives memories of the Soviet nuclear-armed flotilla ensuring Indian victory in the Bangladesh liberation war. Now, the Eastern Maritime Corridor should have an important Chinese port en route. China is an iron neighbour, which can and should become a friend.

Beware Of Sarama's Curse

 Everybody knows that Mahabharata ends with the story of Yudhishtira refusing to walk into the gates of heaven without the dog that accompanied him all the way up. Well, that’s a story about Yudhishtira passing the test of Dharma; not about the dog. Whereas Mahabharata’s opening chapter tells the tale of a “stray” dog getting beaten up at King Janamejaya’s yaga by the royal siblings as is the wont of most rulers.

The dog complained to its mother that it neither tasted nor even looked at the priestly offerings. The mother, Sarama, went to Janamejaya’s yagashala and cursed the king for meting out injustice, which is the worst that a ruler can be accused of. The curse of paranoia or adrishta bhayam, unfounded fear that cripples a person from all actions, is what Sarama divined as punishment for the king.

There are no all-knowing-kings and blind subjects in Sanatana Dharma, but equal beings who have the moral force to curse the ruler for an unjust act. What the BJP’s Union government is doing to Indies or the Indian Street Dogs is worse than what King Janamejaya’s brothers did to Sarameya (Sarama’s son). The government wants the complete erasure of the dog populace from the streets of Delhi, Noida, Ghaziabad and Faridabad, locking them up in faraway shelters, which are practically impossible to maintain. The logic that non-vegetarians should not be animal lovers and hence have no right to speak for the Indies was not expected of top government dignitaries.

There is a reason why vegetarians and non-vegetarians equally love dogs. Unlike any other species in the animal kingdom, dogs are ready to lay their lives down for their human friends and can be controlled by a word or a biscuit. No other species can sniff out human beings under the debris of high rises when machines fail. Nobody asks a dog whether it eats chicken or mutton while it tracks down terrorist hideouts. Was Indra, the king of Devas, a vegetarian to be raising Sarama? One must look into the scriptures.

But the scriptures clearly spell out that ours is not an anthropocentric culture. Indians have been imagining anthropomorphic roles for animals long, long before the invention of the idea of dog parents.

Stray dogs make roads all over the country unsafe in the night. But Indies are only like packs of Indian men, who make strangers, particularly women feel unsafe on Indian roads. I am scared of all strange dogs and while on vacation in Kerala I had once requested my brother to pick me up from his own street because I was challenged by a pack of strays. Well, the situation can be rephrased. The pack was guarding the neighbourhood in the night, and I was a stranger there.

Packs of Indian strays can quickly turn hostile and make deadly attacks on strangers in the night. Gregory David Roberts’ novel Shantaram has one of the best descriptions of such an attack. Their behaviour as a pack somewhat reflects that of an angry Indian mob. But individuals are never equated to blood thirsty mobs in this subcontinent that have killed millions of neighbours and fellow beings.

Whereas, as individuals, the people of the subcontinent have only tales of generosity and hospitality to say about each other. So, is the case with our dogs. Then, why try to cleanse Delhi of the poor community dogs? Yes, there is a big difference between feral strays and community dogs. For instance, our neighbourhood community dogs are like Sarameyas. Each one of Govanti’s litter has collars and names: Gontu, Blackie and Chotti. They are all sterilised and vaccinated. Then there are Jojo, Socks, Bru and Rani on the main road. Rani is missing and the feeders are still searching for her.

The most striking point is that there is not a single pup in our community and proves how effective the feeders have been in keeping them all neutered and spayed, which is actually the government’s job. The so-called dog menace can be tackled effectively by spaying and neutering, and the failure thereof can easily be detected by spotting young pups. The kindest of creatures cannot be culled for the failure of those who are supposed to do their job of sterilisation and vaccination.

Those who feed these community dogs are not elites as is being mistaken. They are common people who because of some quirk of mind took to loving instead of hating. They are cobblers, street vendors, shopkeepers, lonely guards, angry aunts, busy homemakers and also careerwomen. Yes, most of them are women and there is a distinguishing feature of an undemanding parenting instinct in them –– cherishing the joy of having forever toddlers around them.

The aggressively biting dogs, no doubt, should be picked up and euthanised. But the rest of the community dogs have nothing but love to offer in return for a pat on its head. They even stop barking when you tell them so. The greatest ego-booster recently was when Blackie, charging at a boy, stopped on her tracks and tamely retreated when I just said “No”. What we don’t understand is that the Indies like Indians are always anxious about their survival, about getting attacked by friends who turn foes. Our dogs’ genetic memory is fear of the humans.

Politically, this topic is a hot potato. Even those who spout the vilest abuses against Rahul Gandhi have reposted his comment against the attempt to relocate Indies. Some BJP voters are convinced that the government’s stand against the Indies is an attempt to distract attention from Rahul Gandhi’s Vote Choricampaign. In fact, between dogs and the BJP, at least a small chunk of voters may favour the former and endorse the Vote Chori allegations.

Rabies is a deadly reality but can be prevented by vaccination. To capture community dogs and to put them in cages is a Nazi Final Solution for the simple problem of corruption in the vaccination and sterilisation programmes.

It Ain't About Trump, Tariff or Trade But Total Control

 The Indo-Soviet Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation was signed by then Foreign Minister Swaran Singh on August 9, 1971. Now, 54 years later, on another rain-drenched monsoon day, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval calls on Russian President Vladimir Putin on August 7. That too when the true legatee of US President Richard Nixon, who dismissed Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi with an abusive epithet in 1971, is hosting the Pakistani general after a conflict with India, slapping a 50-per cent-tariff on Indian exports to the US and deriding India as a dead economy. Too much of a coincidence.

Well, the coincidence ends there and new geopolitical realities take over. External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar’s mid-July meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping to break the ice that had dangerously turned glacial in Ladakh was a success. It was a diplomatic breakthrough after viewing each other through the gunsights for five years. The first step thereafter is Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s proposed visit to China to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit on August 31. This detente comes after seven years of frozen ties at the top.

Now to add drama to diplomacy, there is talk of Putin visiting India either later this year or even later this month to proceed to China hand-in-hand with Modi. That would be some grand theatre Modi would love. Russia is a founding member of the SCO and there is every possibility of a trilateral summit at Tianjin between Xi, Modi and Putin. And such a meeting has the potential to change the balance of power in the region. The Russia-India-China platform could easily replace the half-a-century old Indo-Soviet Treaty and bring in stability, peace and prosperity to the region.

It is easy to forget that Soviet Union had lent a balancing pole in the post-War world. But for Soviet intervention, much of Asia would have remained colonial outposts for Western plunder. And no Gandhian fasts or revolutionary assassination tactics could have worked against Napalm bombs. It was Soviet Union which armed and assisted the newly independent colonies against the continuing Western dominance, direct or indirect. Pakistan’s wars against India were all indirect attacks by the West against India’s sovereignty.

Trump’s tariff tantrums should be seen in this context of shifting geopolitics in Eurasia. After having effectively controlled the national discourse in India, the West believed it could turn India into a military ally against China. The Ukraine-Russia proxy war was to be replicated in the Himalayan heights to wear China down through attrition and possible escalation. This point of friction in the mountains was blown out of proportion by Opposition politicians and the media. And there were no woke anti-war activists seeking to resolve the conflict as it is always seen in the case of hostilities with Pakistan.

This India-China tension had the potential to deal death blows to the Indian economy, to decelerate China’s rise, tie India to Western apron strings, and also to finish off the politics of Hindutva nationalism. This trick is from an older copy book. The tactic had succeeded against a rising India in 1962, serving a debilitating blow to Jawaharlal Nehru’s international standing and domestic reverential acceptance. India lost its national confidence and had to wait till 1971 to retrieve it; madly scrambled for Western support and Nehru died a broken man.

But the tactic did not work this time around because the Indian leadership saw through the Western game. It is mending the image of a proxy that was being used by the West against a rising neighbour. It honoured its old relationship with its only benefactor –– now much reduced and in trouble –– and bought oil from this old friend. Russian oil sales directly impact the revenue of the Western oil companies. The Islamic oil producers’ sovereignty, strictly speaking, does not extend to their oil revenues, some of which still accrue to the Western coffers, particularly from Iraq. The celebration of purdah and hijab in the West is not accidental, but a deliberate attempt to confine West Asia into a regressive, Islamic cocoon whose only window is to the West.

In Narendra Sarila’s The Shadow of the Great Game, the former ADC to the Last British Viceroy to India, quotes then British Chief of Staff General Leslie Hollis writing to Prime Minister Clement Atlee on May 12, 1947: “we would draw your attention to the sorry results of refusing an application by Mr. Jinnah –– which would in effect amount to ejecting a numerous and loyal people from the British Commonwealth. We should probably have lost all chance of ever getting strategic facilities anywhere in India (subcontinent); we should have shattered our reputation in the Muslim world and could not look for continued cooperation of Middle Eastern countries…”

Sarila establishes that the creation of Pakistan by the British was to primarily protect the oil reserves in West Asia. A militarised, nuclear-armed Islamic Republic in the Indian subcontinent was and still is a strategic inevitability for the West. Post-World War II, Pax Americana replaced Pax Brittania with little change in the Western political and cultural hegemony in post-colonial states like India. The Indira Gandhi aberration was quickly reversed by the mid-1980s.

Now, it is this neo-colonial hegemony that is being questioned by the new Indian leadership, which is trying to build a region of stability. China has never attempted cultural hegemony by imposing Mandarin or its religion (or lack of it), or attempted regime change in the neighbourhood. Whereas India is steadily losing itself to the West in terms of language, religion and much else.

Trump’s tariff bluster, hosting of the self-appointed tinpot Field Marshal and limiting of India’s sovereignty by imposing penalties on Russian oil should all be seen as an extension of the Western neocolonial hegemony over the “jewel of the British (read Western) crown”. Modi’s statement that he is protecting the interests of Indian farmers at a very high personal price has an echo of Indira Gandhi’s last speech at Bhubaneshwar. India is indeed at a geopolitical turning point. And if Modi’s gamble pays off and a Russia-India-China platform emerges as a reality, none of this would matter, neither tariff, nor bluster. For Asian sovereignty could herald an era of peace for the entire world.

Trump's Tantrums Are A Sideshow

India’s entry into the World Trade Organisation ––– rather Indian politicians rushing into a global trade minefield where the Chinese were wary to tread ––– left the country’s manufacturing sector bankrupt. Now, Indians can’t hook up to a Wi-Fi connection without a Chinese dongle. It was impossible to replace a faulty telecom equipment during the Ladakh standoff, when restrictions were imposed on Chinese imports. India’s dependence on Chinese Active Pharma Ingredients to produce antibiotics is near total ––– 80 to 90 per cent.

While India joined WTO under Prime Minister Narasimha Rao the very first day itself on January 1, 1995, China took nearly seven years to study and prepare and only then did they step in on December 11, 2001. And now China rules the manufacturing world, while India is struggling to set up assembly lines for foreign industrialists.

India is where it is solely because of the Western assets in Indian politics, bureaucracy and media. Anyone who had then questioned India’s entry into the WTO used to get damned and named a dinosaur, who wanted to reinvent the wheel. The West wanted China to be the world’s factory and India a poor, underdeveloped market. But then, the assumption that the Chinese would be perpetually and mindlessly running factories for Western profiteers was proved wrong.

When China became a threat and a competitor, the West dumped the “rules-based international order” and “multilateralism” and has begun sealing bilateral trade agreements. Now, the West wants to reinvent the wheel, everywhere, particularly back home.

 

Trump’s insults, accusations and rants should only be seen in the light of a post-WTO continuum. His personal style and slights have little to do with all the bilateral treaties that are getting finalised all over the world. The UK, the UAE, Australia and European Free Trade Association have signed trade treaties with India. Trump’s tantrums are just a side show.

But what is at stake is India’s sovereignty, food security, rural employment, farming income and the steep climb from starvation-level poverty. Kalahandi, Bolangir and Koraput are three districts of Odisha known not-so-long ago for starvation deaths and sale of infants for a bowl of rice. Naveen Patnaik’s miracle in Odisha was to make people grow food grains that the state government would buy. This assured payment made these districts along with the rest of the state surplus in rice.

It is that surplus, which Trump has set his eyes on. India’s green and white revolutions that turned a post-colonial misery into a food-surplus, self-respecting nation are sought to be dismantled. India is being asked to turn the clock back and allow US imports in agricultural and dairy sectors. If while pushing the country into WTO, Indian policy and opinion-makers had brought in manufacturing servitude, the new Bilateral Trade Agreement seems to have all the ingredients to throw the nation into food-dependency.
Cheap electronic, telecom and digital device imports made India into a country that only produces cyber coolies and coding cooks without a single breakthrough innovation in hardware or software. Neither a Blackberry, nor a Nokia, nor a Harmony OS!

Worse than Trump’s cheap digs at India having to buy oil from Pakistan was the news of Microsoft switching off its services to Indian oil refiner Nayara Energy, which is partly owned (49.13 per cent) by Russian oil major Rosneft. The West is trying to deny India its sovereignty not just through coercive trade practices but by weaponising technology paid for by Indian entities.

If Big Tech companies are operating according to the military objectives and foreign policy dictates of the West, should not their sales and revenues in India be reported by Indian authorities as import expenses? If so, do not their Indian revenues contribute towards balancing the so-called trade surplus that India has with the US?

India has been so mindful of the US interests that it still has not publicised all the red lines that the US team wants to cross in the Bilateral Trade Agreement negotiations. There could be a groundswell of opinion in favour of Modi, if India decides to put out in the public domain all those unreasonable US demands that threaten the country’s food security and sovereignty. Trump has made it more and more difficult for the US to get a favourable deal with India as his insults cross the threshold of diplomatic tolerance.

In fact, Trump has offered a reality check to Modi about the possibilities in India-US relations ––– present and future. The widely held perception in India was that a Democrat President was detrimental to bilateral relations with even some BJP insiders speculating an attempt at a regime change operation in India. Hence, Trump’s win was seen as Modi’s position getting bolstered with many believing in some sort of a personal rapport between the two leaders. That belief is in tatters.

Trump has done a great favour to Modi and India at large by revealing US’s bipartisan support for Pakistan –– being the guardians and guarantors of its nuclear arsenal. The alacrity with which Trump jumped in to save Pakistan when its nuclear storage facility was targeted must have sent a message to China as well. After all, the target of a weapon is determined by the one who really owns it.

And it is to Modi’s credit that his perceived friendship with Trump did not deter him from drawing red lines to protect India’s food security and trade concerns. Despite Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi using every bit of Trumpian abuses to target Modi, the latter has not flinched yet. The difference between 1995 and 2025 is that India’s market is no longer up for grabs.

The world becomes multipolar only when the oppressed people desire so. This is one such moment. It is India’s destiny to strengthen genuine multilateralism where in the name of trade self-respecting nations are not expected to surrender their sovereignty and pay tributes to a bully.

While India joined WTO under Prime Minister Narasimha Rao the very first day itself on January 1, 1995, China took nearly seven years to study and prepare and only then did they step in on December 11, 2001. And now China rules the manufacturing world, while India is struggling to set up assembly lines for foreign industrialists.

India is where it is solely because of the Western assets in Indian politics, bureaucracy and media. Anyone who had then questioned India’s entry into the WTO used to get damned and named a dinosaur, who wanted to reinvent the wheel. The West wanted China to be the world’s factory and India a poor, underdeveloped market. But then, the assumption that the Chinese would be perpetually and mindlessly running factories for Western profiteers was proved wrong.

When China became a threat and a competitor, the West dumped the “rules-based international order” and “multilateralism” and has begun sealing bilateral trade agreements. Now, the West wants to reinvent the wheel, everywhere, particularly back home.

Trump’s insults, accusations and rants should only be seen in the light of a post-WTO continuum. His personal style and slights have little to do with all the bilateral treaties that are getting finalised all over the world. The UK, the UAE, Australia and European Free Trade Association have signed trade treaties with India. Trump’s tantrums are just a side show.

But what is at stake is India’s sovereignty, food security, rural employment, farming income and the steep climb from starvation-level poverty. Kalahandi, Bolangir and Koraput are three districts of Odisha known not-so-long ago for starvation deaths and sale of infants for a bowl of rice. Naveen Patnaik’s miracle in Odisha was to make people grow food grains that the state government would buy. This assured payment made these districts along with the rest of the state surplus in rice.

It is that surplus, which Trump has set his eyes on. India’s green and white revolutions that turned a post-colonial misery into a food-surplus, self-respecting nation are sought to be dismantled. India is being asked to turn the clock back and allow US imports in agricultural and dairy sectors. If while pushing the country into WTO, Indian policy and opinion-makers had brought in manufacturing servitude, the new Bilateral Trade Agreement seems to have all the ingredients to throw the nation into food-dependency.

Cheap electronic, telecom and digital device imports made India into a country that only produces cyber coolies and coding cooks without a single breakthrough innovation in hardware or software. Neither a Blackberry, nor a Nokia, nor a Harmony OS!

Worse than Trump’s cheap digs at India having to buy oil from Pakistan was the news of Microsoft switching off its services to Indian oil refiner Nayara Energy, which is partly owned (49.13 per cent) by Russian oil major Rosneft. The West is trying to deny India its sovereignty not just through coercive trade practices but by weaponising technology paid for by Indian entities.

If Big Tech companies are operating according to the military objectives and foreign policy dictates of the West, should not their sales and revenues in India be reported by Indian authorities as import expenses? If so, do not their Indian revenues contribute towards balancing the so-called trade surplus that India has with the US?

India has been so mindful of the US interests that it still has not publicised all the red lines that the US team wants to cross in the Bilateral Trade Agreement negotiations. There could be a groundswell of opinion in favour of Modi, if India decides to put out in the public domain all those unreasonable US demands that threaten the country’s food security and sovereignty. Trump has made it more and more difficult for the US to get a favourable deal with India as his insults cross the threshold of diplomatic tolerance.

In fact, Trump has offered a reality check to Modi about the possibilities in India-US relations ––– present and future. The widely held perception in India was that a Democrat President was detrimental to bilateral relations with even some BJP insiders speculating an attempt at a regime change operation in India. Hence, Trump’s win was seen as Modi’s position getting bolstered with many believing in some sort of a personal rapport between the two leaders. That belief is in tatters.

Trump has done a great favour to Modi and India at large by revealing US’s bipartisan support for Pakistan –– being the guardians and guarantors of its nuclear arsenal. The alacrity with which Trump jumped in to save Pakistan when its nuclear storage facility was targeted must have sent a message to China as well. After all, the target of a weapon is determined by the one who really owns it.

And it is to Modi’s credit that his perceived friendship with Trump did not deter him from drawing red lines to protect India’s food security and trade concerns. Despite Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi using every bit of Trumpian abuses to target Modi, the latter has not flinched yet. The difference between 1995 and 2025 is that India’s market is no longer up for grabs.

The world becomes multipolar only when the oppressed people desire so. This is one such moment. It is India’s destiny to strengthen genuine multilateralism where in the name of trade self-respecting nations are not expected to surrender their sovereignty and pay tributes to a bully.

While India joined WTO under Prime Minister Narasimha Rao the very first day itself on January 1, 1995, China took nearly seven years to study and prepare and only then did they step in on December 11, 2001. And now China rules the manufacturing world, while India is struggling to set up assembly lines for foreign industrialists.

India is where it is solely because of the Western assets in Indian politics, bureaucracy and media. Anyone who had then questioned India’s entry into the WTO used to get damned and named a dinosaur, who wanted to reinvent the wheel. The West wanted China to be the world’s factory and India a poor, underdeveloped market. But then, the assumption that the Chinese would be perpetually and mindlessly running factories for Western profiteers was proved wrong.

When China became a threat and a competitor, the West dumped the “rules-based international order” and “multilateralism” and has begun sealing bilateral trade agreements. Now, the West wants to reinvent the wheel, everywhere, particularly back home.

Trump’s insults, accusations and rants should only be seen in the light of a post-WTO continuum. His personal style and slights have little to do with all the bilateral treaties that are getting finalised all over the world. The UK, the UAE, Australia and European Free Trade Association have signed trade treaties with India. Trump’s tantrums are just a side show.

But what is at stake is India’s sovereignty, food security, rural employment, farming income and the steep climb from starvation-level poverty. Kalahandi, Bolangir and Koraput are three districts of Odisha known not-so-long ago for starvation deaths and sale of infants for a bowl of rice. Naveen Patnaik’s miracle in Odisha was to make people grow food grains that the state government would buy. This assured payment made these districts along with the rest of the state surplus in rice.

It is that surplus, which Trump has set his eyes on. India’s green and white revolutions that turned a post-colonial misery into a food-surplus, self-respecting nation are sought to be dismantled. India is being asked to turn the clock back and allow US imports in agricultural and dairy sectors. If while pushing the country into WTO, Indian policy and opinion-makers had brought in manufacturing servitude, the new Bilateral Trade Agreement seems to have all the ingredients to throw the nation into food-dependency.

Cheap electronic, telecom and digital device imports made India into a country that only produces cyber coolies and coding cooks without a single breakthrough innovation in hardware or software. Neither a Blackberry, nor a Nokia, nor a Harmony OS!

Worse than Trump’s cheap digs at India having to buy oil from Pakistan was the news of Microsoft switching off its services to Indian oil refiner Nayara Energy, which is partly owned (49.13 per cent) by Russian oil major Rosneft. The West is trying to deny India its sovereignty not just through coercive trade practices but by weaponising technology paid for by Indian entities.

If Big Tech companies are operating according to the military objectives and foreign policy dictates of the West, should not their sales and revenues in India be reported by Indian authorities as import expenses? If so, do not their Indian revenues contribute towards balancing the so-called trade surplus that India has with the US?

India has been so mindful of the US interests that it still has not publicised all the red lines that the US team wants to cross in the Bilateral Trade Agreement negotiations. There could be a groundswell of opinion in favour of Modi, if India decides to put out in the public domain all those unreasonable US demands that threaten the country’s food security and sovereignty. Trump has made it more and more difficult for the US to get a favourable deal with India as his insults cross the threshold of diplomatic tolerance.

In fact, Trump has offered a reality check to Modi about the possibilities in India-US relations ––– present and future. The widely held perception in India was that a Democrat President was detrimental to bilateral relations with even some BJP insiders speculating an attempt at a regime change operation in India. Hence, Trump’s win was seen as Modi’s position getting bolstered with many believing in some sort of a personal rapport between the two leaders. That belief is in tatters.

Trump has done a great favour to Modi and India at large by revealing US’s bipartisan support for Pakistan –– being the guardians and guarantors of its nuclear arsenal. The alacrity with which Trump jumped in to save Pakistan when its nuclear storage facility was targeted must have sent a message to China as well. After all, the target of a weapon is determined by the one who really owns it.

And it is to Modi’s credit that his perceived friendship with Trump did not deter him from drawing red lines to protect India’s food security and trade concerns. Despite Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi using every bit of Trumpian abuses to target Modi, the latter has not flinched yet. The difference between 1995 and 2025 is that India’s market is no longer up for grabs.

The world becomes multipolar only when the oppressed people desire so. This is one such moment. It is India’s destiny to strengthen genuine multilateralism where in the name of trade self-respecting nations are not expected to surrender their sovereignty and pay tributes to a bully.

While India joined WTO under Prime Minister Narasimha Rao the very first day itself on January 1, 1995, China took nearly seven years to study and prepare and only then did they step in on December 11, 2001. And now China rules the manufacturing world, while India is struggling to set up assembly lines for foreign industrialists.

India is where it is solely because of the Western assets in Indian politics, bureaucracy and media. Anyone who had then questioned India’s entry into the WTO used to get damned and named a dinosaur, who wanted to reinvent the wheel. The West wanted China to be the world’s factory and India a poor, underdeveloped market. But then, the assumption that the Chinese would be perpetually and mindlessly running factories for Western profiteers was proved wrong.

When China became a threat and a competitor, the West dumped the “rules-based international order” and “multilateralism” and has begun sealing bilateral trade agreements. Now, the West wants to reinvent the wheel, everywhere, particularly back home.

Trump’s insults, accusations and rants should only be seen in the light of a post-WTO continuum. His personal style and slights have little to do with all the bilateral treaties that are getting finalised all over the world. The UK, the UAE, Australia and European Free Trade Association have signed trade treaties with India. Trump’s tantrums are just a side show.

But what is at stake is India’s sovereignty, food security, rural employment, farming income and the steep climb from starvation-level poverty. Kalahandi, Bolangir and Koraput are three districts of Odisha known not-so-long ago for starvation deaths and sale of infants for a bowl of rice. Naveen Patnaik’s miracle in Odisha was to make people grow food grains that the state government would buy. This assured payment made these districts along with the rest of the state surplus in rice.

It is that surplus, which Trump has set his eyes on. India’s green and white revolutions that turned a post-colonial misery into a food-surplus, self-respecting nation are sought to be dismantled. India is being asked to turn the clock back and allow US imports in agricultural and dairy sectors. If while pushing the country into WTO, Indian policy and opinion-makers had brought in manufacturing servitude, the new Bilateral Trade Agreement seems to have all the ingredients to throw the nation into food-dependency.

Cheap electronic, telecom and digital device imports made India into a country that only produces cyber coolies and coding cooks without a single breakthrough innovation in hardware or software. Neither a Blackberry, nor a Nokia, nor a Harmony OS!

Worse than Trump’s cheap digs at India having to buy oil from Pakistan was the news of Microsoft switching off its services to Indian oil refiner Nayara Energy, which is partly owned (49.13 per cent) by Russian oil major Rosneft. The West is trying to deny India its sovereignty not just through coercive trade practices but by weaponising technology paid for by Indian entities.

If Big Tech companies are operating according to the military objectives and foreign policy dictates of the West, should not their sales and revenues in India be reported by Indian authorities as import expenses? If so, do not their Indian revenues contribute towards balancing the so-called trade surplus that India has with the US?

India has been so mindful of the US interests that it still has not publicised all the red lines that the US team wants to cross in the Bilateral Trade Agreement negotiations. There could be a groundswell of opinion in favour of Modi, if India decides to put out in the public domain all those unreasonable US demands that threaten the country’s food security and sovereignty. Trump has made it more and more difficult for the US to get a favourable deal with India as his insults cross the threshold of diplomatic tolerance.

In fact, Trump has offered a reality check to Modi about the possibilities in India-US relations ––– present and future. The widely held perception in India was that a Democrat President was detrimental to bilateral relations with even some BJP insiders speculating an attempt at a regime change operation in India. Hence, Trump’s win was seen as Modi’s position getting bolstered with many believing in some sort of a personal rapport between the two leaders. That belief is in tatters.

Trump has done a great favour to Modi and India at large by revealing US’s bipartisan support for Pakistan –– being the guardians and guarantors of its nuclear arsenal. The alacrity with which Trump jumped in to save Pakistan when its nuclear storage facility was targeted must have sent a message to China as well. After all, the target of a weapon is determined by the one who really owns it.

And it is to Modi’s credit that his perceived friendship with Trump did not deter him from drawing red lines to protect India’s food security and trade concerns. Despite Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi using every bit of Trumpian abuses to target Modi, the latter has not flinched yet. The difference between 1995 and 2025 is that India’s market is no longer up for grabs.

The world becomes multipolar only when the oppressed people desire so. This is one such moment. It is India’s destiny to strengthen genuine multilateralism where in the name of trade self-respecting nations are not expected to surrender their sovereignty and pay tributes to a bully.