India oscillates between hope and disappointment over Trump’s return
Last Updated on January 25, 2025 7:27 am
Since the announcement of the results of the US presidential election on November 6, the country that has been the most jubilant in the rest of the world is undoubtedly India. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi also did not delay in greeting the future US president enthusiastically and promising a new partnership.
Exactly two and a half months later, Donald Trump was formally sworn in as the 47th President of the United States, and after a gap of four years, his address has become the White House. His second inauguration was resounding with the triumphant cry of ‘MAGA’, i.e. ‘Make America Great Again’ theme.
But the enthusiasm that was seen in Delhi after Trump’s victory, and especially the new possibilities of the India-US equation that the Hindutva forces in India were bracing for, has now largely subsided.
On the contrary, a cloud of fear and uncertainty has gradually gathered in the atrium of power in Delhi regarding several possible steps of the Trump administration in the coming days.
Prime Minister Modi was also not seen at Trump’s swearing-in ceremony, where India was represented by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. There is also uncertainty as to whether Modi was directly invited to the event.
The ‘personal chemistry’ between Modi and Trump has been the subject of a huge amount of newsprint and airtime in the Indian media over the past few years, and this is a big blow to us Indians!
In fact, when Donald Trump ran for re-election in 2020, Narendra Modi was the only world leader with whom he attended two public rallies in the months leading up to it.
At the ‘Howdy Modi’ event in Houston, Texas in September 2019, Narendra Modi did not hesitate to hold Trump’s hand and shout ‘Ab ki baar Trump Sarkar’.
It was also unprecedented for an Indian Prime Minister to stand on foreign soil and give an election victory speech for a foreign leader. And just five months later, Narendra Modi welcomed President Trump to his eponymous stadium in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, in front of thousands of spectators.
Trump has also experienced Narendra Modi’s famous embrace diplomacy many times. But the kind of public intimacy, friendship and camaraderie that was visible between the two leaders then – has not been seen in the last few months. The two did not meet during Narendra Modi’s visit to America in September.
Narendra Modi did call Donald Trump to congratulate him after his election victory, but there is no evidence that the two have spoken directly since then.
The next summit or summit of the strategic alliance Quad, comprising the United States, India, Australia and Japan, is scheduled to be held in India this year – but it has not yet been confirmed whether President Trump will attend it or not.
This report examines why there is some apprehension in India about Trump 2.0 or the second Trump era – and in some cases, there is reason for India to be hopeful.
Tariff war? Oil sanctions?
Within hours of taking office as president, Donald Trump has warned that his administration is considering imposing a 10 percent tariff on goods imported from China and the European Union. Tariffs are actually his favorite trade tool.
He has been threatening for a long time that he will not hesitate to use this weapon to reduce demand for imported goods in the United States and ensure free access to other markets for American products. And in this ‘tariff war’, India is also heavily targeted, whom he once described as the ‘tariff king’ or ‘king of tariffs’.
Donald Trump’s argument was that almost no country imposes import tariffs as high as India, yet they expect to be able to sell goods made in India in the American market at very low tariffs!
President Trump had made this warning in June 2019. He said, for example, if India does not reduce its 100 percent tariff on our Harley Davidson bikes, then America will have every right to impose high tariffs on Indian products.
Many observers in India also believe that he will at least implement some of this threat after coming to power for a second term.
India is already struggling with a huge trade deficit. America is India’s largest market in the world, and if high tariffs are imposed there, the deficit will increase, and India’s growth will definitely be hampered.
According to Swaminathan Iyer, a well-known economic analyst and author in Delhi, it is clear that his goal is to make America great, not India.
He said, so if India does not reduce its own high tariffs, it is inevitable that huge tariffs will be imposed on India in the American market as well. I am sure that Trump is not just making empty promises in this regard.
Iyer also fears that US sanctions against Iran and Russia will be tightened further during the US administration.
Swaminathan Iyer said that this is not good news for India either, because the way India has been buying cheap oil from Russia and Iran by circumventing the sanctions for the past few years will now become much more difficult.
Incidentally, in the last three years since the start of the Ukraine war, Russia has become India’s main oil supplier, importing crude or unprocessed oil from Russia and refining it in India and exporting it to Europe.
It has also been possible to keep the price of petrol or diesel stable in the domestic market of India because of the cheap oil available from Russia. But now there is a fear that the entire process may become uncertain.
Visa cuts, deportations
Donald Trump also said during his election campaign that he would massively cut the number of H-1B visas so that American companies would hire American residents instead of hiring workers from abroad.
The H-1B is a special type of non-immigrant US visa under which US companies can temporarily hire foreign workers in advanced specialized technological or theoretical fields.
Over the past few decades, millions of Indian nationals have been granted entry to the US under this visa. Many of them are now working or well-established in sectors such as information technology, heavy engineering, cybersecurity or artificial intelligence.
Not only will the number of such foreign workers be reduced under the Trump era, but the children born in the US to parents who came on H-1B will also lose their right to US citizenship, the president issued an executive order on Tuesday (January 21).
In addition, it has been announced that the number of visas for thousands of Indian students who go to US colleges or universities on student visas every year will also be reduced.
Simply put, the Trump administration has already made it clear that it will take all kinds of steps to discourage Indian citizens from moving to America.
As a result, there is a fear that the H-1B door will soon become even more difficult for Indians under the Trump era.
However, there is also the possibility that Indians, although fewer in number, may now find better jobs in America with higher salaries.
In addition, the future of hundreds of thousands of Indians who arrived in America without the right documents is now surrounded by uncertainty.
Legal trouble spots
Last year, during President Biden’s tenure, the charges framed against an Indian intelligence officer for attempting to assassinate a Sikh separatist leader (Gurpatwant Singh Pannu) in New York caused quite a stir in relations between Delhi and Washington. The case is still pending in a US court.
Yale University professor Sushant Singh says that their ‘Five Eyes’ partner Canada is providing all the intelligence information to the US regarding this case. And based on the information provided by Canada, there are indications that Indian Home Minister Amit Shah may also be charged in this case later.
Professor Singh also says that many in India’s Hindutva ecosystem thought that the Trump administration might make a ‘deal’ or secret agreement with India in this regard and Delhi would be exempted from this legal case. But in reality, we saw that Trump appointed Harmeet Dhillon as Assistant Attorney General for Human Rights, who has been vocal about many allegations of human rights violations in India for a long time.
He says that Ms Dhillon condemned the police crackdown on farmers during the farmers’ movement in India. After the murder of Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Canada, she publicly criticized the Modi government. It does not seem that Harmeet Dhillon will abandon this tough stance after being appointed to a new position.
Another case in America that is of great interest in India is the bribery and corruption case against Indian industrialist and billionaire Gautam Adani. Adani is considered to be the closest industrialist to Prime Minister Modi.
Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi has also been continuously attacking Gautam Adani’s closeness to Narendra Modi, to which India’s ruling party BJP has also had to open its mouth to respond.
Even the US State Department is involved in a conspiracy to destabilize India – the BJP has not hesitated to make such allegations publicly, citing the Adani controversy.
Prime Minister Modi has never asked the BJP to withdraw this allegation, and the Indian Ministry of External Affairs has also remained silent when asked about the BJP’s comments.
Yale University Professor Sushant Singh says that the US State Department is not a department of the ruling party of that country. Whether Biden is in power or Trump, it basically functions as a bureaucratic institution and these US bureaucrats have a very sharp memory.
As a result, Professor Singh believes that the State Department must also be dissatisfied with the position of India and the ruling party of India on the Gautam Adani issue.
Will the ‘nose-poking’ on the Bangladesh issue decrease?
The issue that has repeatedly caused open conflict between Delhi and Washington during President Biden’s tenure is Bangladesh.
Delhi has consistently described Sheikh Hasina’s tenure as a ‘stable, peaceful and progressive’ Bangladesh, an assessment with which America has never agreed.
They have given more importance to the decline of democracy and human rights violations in Bangladesh – and this has also come to the fore with India many times.
That dispute reached its peak, as usual, after the dramatic change of power in Dhaka last August.
However, India is now hoping that America’s ‘hyperactivity’ regarding Bangladesh will decrease a lot during the Trump administration. Because the new administration may not care much about what is happening or not happening in a small country in far South Asia.
Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar said in Delhi before leaving to attend Trump’s swearing-in ceremony that we are all probably facing a new era now. America will now formulate its foreign policy looking at its own interests, and will not be so concerned about the good and bad of the whole world.
As a result, America will now show a lot of indifference towards Bangladesh – and that will give India the opportunity to expand its influence there again on its own side of the house – this is what India is expecting, observers in Delhi explain.
S Jaishankar also raised the issue of Bangladesh in his first meeting with the new US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the country’s National Security Advisor Mike Walz in Washington.
In response to a question at a press conference at the Indian Embassy in Washington on Wednesday (January 22), he said, “Yes, we have had a brief discussion about Bangladesh. But it would not be appropriate to disclose the details here.”
However, there is no reason to think that the Trump administration will start talking in India’s tone again from day one on Bangladesh, says Sanjay Bhardwaj, a professor of international relations at JNU.
Dr. Bharadwaj was saying that from tomorrow onwards, there will be no more differences or differences of views between Delhi and Washington on Bangladesh – I don’t think India is expecting anything like that.
He is saying, however, that it is certainly expected that the Trump administration will at least take a positive role in the issue of the persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh that India has been vocal about for quite some time, or the anti-India activities on Bangladeshi soil that have been worrying Delhi lately.
Incidentally, Donald Trump had spoken out against the persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh just three days before the US presidential election. This time, he has also received the support of a very large section of Hindu voters of Indian origin in America.
During the Biden era, the differences between India and America on the Bangladesh issue had become so severe that it is unlikely that the issue could go any lower.
The situation is bound to improve under the Trump administration – for now, this is the deep belief in the inner circle of power in Delhi.
So, which way is the relationship heading?
Before returning home on Wednesday after a busy four-day visit to Washington, Jaishankar was asked by an Indian journalist how he got a seat in the front row, almost facing Trump, at the president’s swearing-in ceremony.
Jaishankar replied that it is not natural that a special representative of Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the ceremony would receive such attention.
It is clear from the Indian Foreign Minister’s words that they want to show off the personal chemistry and cordial equation between Modi and Trump this time too, which India wants to convey that will have an impact on bilateral relations.
Jaishankar also highly praised the enthusiasm and vitality that is visible in the new US administration. He also explained that Modi 3.0 is looking forward to working actively with Trump 2.0.
Senior Indian journalist and foreign policy observer Prabhu Chawla, however, wants to see the matter from a slightly different perspective.
He said, “I don’t think personal chemistry will play a role here.” Trump is essentially telling India to forget about your relationship with other countries when dealing with America – or else be prepared to suffer the consequences.
Source: BBC Bangla