The US-India relationship is “very complicated” but the two countries will ultimately find common ground because President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have a “very good rapport,” US treasury secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday, the day Washington’s 50 per cent tariff on Indian exports kicked in.
Bessent accused India of “dragging” the trade-agreement negotiations.
“This is a complicated relationship,” he told Fox News Business. “President Trump and Prime Minister Modi have a very good rapport at the top level, but it’s not just about Russian oil.”
Bessent said he was disappointed at the pace of the trade talks.
“India came in early after Liberation Day [April 2, when Trump announced his tariffs] to begin negotiating on tariffs, yet we still don’t have a deal,” he said. “I had expected an agreement by May or June. I thought India could be one of the first countries to strike a deal, but instead they have dragged out the negotiations.
“On top of that, there’s the issue of Russian crude purchases, which they’ve been profiting from,” he added.
The tariff move follows five rounds of failed talks, but Bessent expressed optimism.
“There are many layers to this situation. Still, India is the world’s largest democracy, and the US is the world’s largest economy. At the end of the day, I believe the two countries will come together,” he said.
Bessent said some of India’s negotiating posture has been “performative”.
“I’ve said this all along during the tariff negotiations, the US is the deficit country,” he said.
US-India two-way goods trade totalled $129 billion in 2024 with a $45.8 billion deficit for Washington, according to US census bureau data.
“When there is a schism in trade relations, the deficit country is at an advantage. It’s the surplus country that should worry. So the Indians are selling to us, they have very high tariffs, and we have a very large deficit with them,” he said.
On Russian oil purchases, Bessent seemed to nudge Europe to follow America’s lead.
“Our European allies need to step up. I don’t see them threatening the tariffs on the Indians. As a matter of fact, they’re the ones buying the refined products that’s made from the Russian oil,” he said.
New Delhi has signalled little willingness to make concessions under pressure. India has rejected US accusations on Russian oil as double standards, pointing at the exemption for China, Moscow’s biggest customer.
Two days before the tariffs kicked in, Prime Minister Modi had said his government “can’t compromise on the interests of farmers, cattle-rearers, small-scale industries.”
He had said: “Pressure on us may increase, but we will bear it.”
Junior foreign minister Kirti Vardhan Singh said on Wednesday that India “will continue to purchase energy sources from whichever country benefits us”.
Asked whether he feared India might shift trade away from the dollar and toward the rupee, particularly within Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa), Bessent dismissed the idea: “There are a lot of things I worry about. The rupee becoming a reserve currency isn’t one of them.”
