Donald Trump's Presidency of the United States will open new opportunities for India though certain sectors, especially pharma and IT, may face the heat if the incoming president decides to impose restrictions on imports and H1B visa regulations, experts said on Wednesday. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's friendly relationship with Trump will have a positive bearing on Indo-US relations but India may have to adapt its strategies to maintain cooperation in areas of mutual interest.
The stage may be set for a recalibrated US-Iran relationship, suggests Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
A US military aircraft carrying 112 Indian deportees landed at the Amritsar airport late on Sunday night, marking the third such flight in recent weeks. The deportees, who hail from various states across India, will be allowed to return home after completing necessary immigration procedures. The deportations are part of a crackdown by the Donald Trump administration against illegal immigrants.
India on Saturday announced plans to amend its nuclear liability law and set up a nuclear energy mission, a move that came ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's likely visit to the United States.
'There is no question that Putin's preference will be to avoid unpleasantness with Trump, leave alone a collision course,' observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
A federal judge in Seattle has temporarily blocked former President Donald Trump's executive order seeking to terminate birthright citizenship in the United States, calling the policy 'blatantly unconstitutional', CNN reported.
'If you compare the data from 2017 and 2023 of the US imports from the world and China, you will see that the US was a complete loser in the trade war, and China was a complete gainer.'
Trump has made it clear to Prime Minister Modi that India will not be spared from Washington's reciprocal tariffs and emphasised that "nobody can argue with me" on tariff structure.
According to experts, even if an additional 5 per cent of people opt to buy new vehicles, it may bring a huge boost to the sector.
The extension aims to facilitate negotiations for a solution that safeguards national security and allows the app to continue operating in the United States. Trump proposed a joint venture granting the US a 50 per cent ownership stake in TikTok.
TikTok's app effectively shut down in the US, just hours before a law banning the popular video-sharing platform was set to go into effect. The app was shut down on Saturday, displaying a message that the app "isn't available right now," but expects resolution under President-elect Trump. The Supreme Court on Friday unanimously upheld the divest-or-ban law, which gave TikTok's China-based parent company ByteDance until Sunday to divest from the app. President Trump said Saturday that he would most likely give TikTok a 90-day extension. Following Friday's Supreme Court decision, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew thanked the president-elect for his commitment to finding a solution to keep the app accessible in the US.
How have aspirations, ambitions and hopes broken down for these young men from the most advanced parts of India? asks Mihir S Sharma.
Trump's sweeping tariffs and penalties on China-built ships have turned global shipping into the front line of economic war, observes Shyam G Menon.
Musk said on Friday that he believes India-US ties are "trending positive" and that he favours an enhanced trade partnership between the two nations.
'The US has agreed to negotiate with us a mutually beneficial bilateral trade agreement, which will go for reduction of tariffs on both sides so that our trade can grow.'
Opposition leaders in India have expressed hope that Prime Minister Narendra Modi raised the issue of the deportation of Indian illegal immigrants from the United States during his recent visit. They criticized the manner in which the Indians were sent back, shackled and handcuffed on a military aircraft. The leaders also discussed the need for India to address the root causes of migration and the importance of national interest in diplomatic relations with the United States.
'Modi's intention was to create goodwill that will allow India to be seen by Trump as more than just a bad tariff problem.' 'He succeeded brilliantly on that count but none of these wins are unfortunately permanent.' 'Modi will have to do this again and again if Trump's grievances are to be durably assuaged.'
Modi lived up to his declaration that his visit was purely meant to strengthen India's relationship with the US, but there may be situations in which our silence on some issues will haunt us in the future, cautions Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann has criticized the Centre over the landing of US planes carrying illegal Indian immigrants at Amritsar airport, calling it a "deport centre." He stated that the holy city is known for its religious sites and should not be used for deportations. Mann has also questioned the choice of Amritsar as the landing site, suggesting that other airports in the country could have been used instead. The second US flight carrying 119 illegal Indian immigrants is slated to land in Amritsar on Saturday night. The Punjab government has made arrangements to take the residents of Punjab from among the second batch of deportees to their hometowns.
The US Supreme Court has upheld a law requiring TikTok's China-based parent company to divest from the app, paving the way for the popular platform to be banned from the US starting Sunday. The court's decision was unanimous, with the justices citing national security concerns related to TikTok's data collection practices and relationship with a foreign adversary. While existing users may still access the app, new users will be unable to download it and updates will no longer be available. The decision comes as the Biden administration prepares to hand over the reins to the incoming Trump administration, which is expected to review the situation before making a final determination on TikTok's fate.
The India-United States relationship is set to expand under the Donald Trump administration, but there could be some unease on issues like imports, tariffs and immigration, strategic affairs experts said after the Republican leader won the fiercely contested presidential election.
'We are not incentivising the old tax scheme. These taxpayers will also shift to the new regime after comparison.'
'...he keeps his campaign promises, does what he said he will do which led to his huge victory.'
'As the global economy undergoes significant transformations in 2025, India's ability to navigate the complexities of trade wars, financial realignments, and emerging blocs will be pivotal,' explain Harsh V Pant and Soumya Bhowmik.
Of Trump's reciprocal tariffs and trade deals
Glimpses of Republican presidential nominee Donald J Trump's final campaign rally at the PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, November 4, 2024.
Global brokerage firm CLSA has reversed its early tactical shift from Indian equities to Chinese stocks, and has decided to raise India allocation while cutting exposure to China. In its report titled 'Pouncing Tiger, Prevaricating Dragon', CLSA cited challenges facing Chinese markets in the aftermath of Donald Trump's victory in the US elections as the reason for the move. "Misfortune can happen in threes. So it has played out for Chinese equities over the past week.
Soon after he was sworn in by Vice President J D Vance, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio hosted External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Penny Wong from Australia and Japan's Iwaya Takeshi for his first multilateral meeting as the top American diplomat.
Notably Trump had withdrawn from the Paris Agreement immediately after his first inauguration in January 2017. Joe Biden reversed that decision later.
The US is currently Earth's most powerful country and a certain latitude of understanding -- a world view -- is popularly expected from its leadership. From a country identified with freedom, constitution, debate, democracy and the likes of Abraham Lincoln even as it had the most powerful military around, the US, following Trump's actions, seemed repositioned as militarily powerful with other qualities secondary, observes Shyam G Menon.
The changes if legalised would have a detrimental effect on the functioning of Indian tech companies in the US and also small and medium-sized contractual farms in the IT sector, which are mostly owned by Indian Americans.
Murthy is the second Indian-American to be removed by the Trump administration from a senior position.
A strong partnership with US would deter China from making any aggressive posture against India, said Puneet Ahluwalia, a member of the Trump's Advisory Committee on Asian Americans.
In the weeks between his phenomenal electoral victory and swearing-in as the 47th president of the United States, the world got a preview of what a second Donald Trump presidency will entail -- both for itself and America.
Lisa Curtis, who served as deputy assistant to President Trump and as National Security Council senior director for South and Central Asia from 2017 to 2021, said she expected the same bumps for India and the US, as in Trump's first term, including tariff, dependence on Russia over arms supply and oil purchase from Iran. Curtis, however, said both countries could never enter an alliance but develop a partnership that is "short of an alliance". She hoped them to achieve a cooperation that deters China, but also prepares both countries in case of a crisis or conflict, be it in the Taiwan Strait, the South China Sea, or another flare-up on the India-China border.
'Netanyahu lured Trump into a trap by enticing him with a seductive scenario of massive lucrative business in Gaza's reconstruction.' 'Trump's imagination is running riot, completely disconnected from ground realities,' asserts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'To everyone voting for Trump, I have only this simple question: Would you let him have lunch with your daughter or sister or wife or mother?' 'Then why would you let him have our lunch (and so much more) for four more years?', asks Sree Sreenivasan.
President Donald Trump is expected to sign a series of executive orders fulfilling campaign promises, including declaring an emergency at the southern border, addressing a national energy crisis, and defining sex-related policies. The orders aim to address immigration, national security, and energy independence, with a focus on reversing policies implemented by the previous administration.
However, copious oil supplies amid growing global output and slowing Chinese oil consumption will put India in a better bargaining position with Gulf suppliers.
'Someone posts a job on LinkedIn and there are a thousand resumes in an hour? This is not the America IT professionals are used to.' 'Once they lose their job, it's impossible to get a job.'