Public sentiment surrounding India's trade response to US tariffs is multifaceted, exhibiting both support for the government's assertive stance and pronounced dissatisfaction with its foreign policy strategies. Many commenters express national pride and a desire for self-reliance, yet simultaneously convey frustration over economic pressures from the US and India's dealings with Russia amid sanctions. This results in a polarized view where support for the government contrasts with criticism regarding its international relations.

Government of India

U.S. Government

Congress

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India’s economy is pretty well shielded from the US. They just aren’t the same economies. India has way more to gain from cheap Russian oil than it has to gain from a trade relationship with the US. Now if the US were to impose tariffs on outsourced cheap labor, that’s a different story.

Novel-Ground-4815

India's exports to the US are about $130 billion in a $3.9 trillion dollar economy. Trump assumes a level of dependency that doesn't exist.  They have a long history of remaining unaligned, and Modi is a nationalist.  I don't know anything about Indian politics, but can Modi afford to look weak?  Because you know that the moment he caves Trump will start bragging to the world that he kicked Modi's ass.

OldManSand

Trump is the greatest gift from god for India, China, and Russia, now they can really start the multipolar world order they've been planning.

fufa_fafu

As an Indian American who is pro US before pro India. Trump might actually be retarded. By far the dumbest president in American history surrounded by a pedo normalizing Republican yes man party.

Repulsive_Race7314

Tarrifs are a tax on the US importer based in the states, Donnie doesn't understand why its not working when its not the exporter getting hit.

Foe117

Trump is a moron. India’s weakness is not in physical product exports to the US, but in outsourced US services. This does not show as deficits, but its impact on the US labor market is arguably far more severe than manufacturing.

areyouentirelysure

This tariff dictator needs to be 🥊 this time. Russian oil is just an excuse there are multiple things behind. US is openly supporting terrorists against India now.

buntybunty384

India will not and should not flinch….India can take on the economic pressure as the nation has survived England ruthless colonialism…for centuries. This is nothing. 
Trump and its acolytes seem to think this is the 19th century….good luck.

Efficient_Resist_287

Its obvious hes targeting the BRICS countries

innocentious

They should have added "THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THE MATTER".

Swag_infinite

As a UK national, it's impossible not to feel VERY small post Brexit.

prefabtrout

Being a citizen of one of the BRICS is to hear your whole life that your country "is not serious"... until Trump proves that Washington is not either.

matheushpsa

It’s refreshing to see the Indian side respond professionally, unlike the US President posting on X.

jayy1709

Good response from India. Just the facts.

How many Americans know that the US is an IMPORTER of nuclear fuel materials from Russia? When the Ukraine conflict invasion by Russia started, I was surprised to find this out, and I've been in the energy business for a good part of my professional career! Russian uranium glows just like American uranium, except that the Russian kind lines the pockets of Mr. Putin and his Oligarchs.

lookskAIwatcher

Also, if the West actually cared, they’d sanction Israel.

Lovefoolofthecentury

toomin10

No-Secretary5892

Using logic? Do they not know how to negotiate in 2025? Bribes, gifts, flattery and "thank you"s.

PseudoTsunami

Mike drop

But also - what the hell is that font?

hamiltonisoverrat3d

Training_Caregiver67

EU and USA together has failed to stop the war, Trump said it would be over within a week if he became president. Now the sole reason they can come up with is that they are unable to stop war because India and China keeps buying Russian oil. So convenient to shift the blame of your failure. If USA thinks it’s bad to buy Russian oil then it should get it sanction as well. It’s not like India is buying something which is sanctioned.

anfumann

The day PEDOnald took that $400 plane bribe from Qatar was the day I knew the US-India relations were doomed. 

CampEmbarrassed170

India is trying to be reasonable about tariffs that were put on them for the most unreasonable and illogical reasons.

Intelligent-Parsley7

Incredible economic and diplomatic genius display from Trump and his red hat retards

JonFrost

Firstly, Russian oil is not banned. There’s a G7 cap on its price and India is buying well under it. The cap was designed to keep oil market prices stable because removing Russian energy would spook prices and create inflation all over the world.

Europe continues to buy Russian energy even today, so does China. In fact, Russian pipeline gas exports to Europe rose 37% month on month in July. Even the US continues to buy chemicals and nuclear fuel from Russia. Yet, why single out India as fueling the Russian war machine?

moshikins22

Isn't palladium used in catalictic converters?

saagc

Made in india🇮🇳✅🆗
Made in America 💲💵❌🙅‍♂️🙅‍♀️
Ameriki saman ko boycott karo koi bhi le. Uski public shaming karo video banao status mai dalo ki kisi ne bhi liya publically humiliate karenge

LegitimateSell6

They are buying oil for cheap from Russia but still selling it at a premium to indian consumers. 100 Rupees a liter is not cheap! Both sides are playing games.

Opening_Magician6513

While the EU and US contributions to the Russian economy are not insignificant, they have greatly pulled back since the Ukraine war began. In that time, India and China have filled a large chunk of the void left behind. 

The Indian government can claim hypocrisy all they want but there is no denying they and China are propping up the Russian economy far more than Russia's other trading partners.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/8/5/india-accuses-us-eu-of-russia-trade-double-standards-who-is-right

Am4oba

Lol comment section is full of Indians acting like random ppl

mossy-raven

krispisss

India spends 68 billion on Russian oil compared to the 1 billion the US spends on Russian uranium.  Not exactly apples to apples.

Bad_User2077

Modipaglus have gone crazy since Trump announced those tariffs.

UNREAL_REALITY221

India has been benefiting from deaths of Ukrainian people. Yes, Europe has been buying resources from Russia which they can't get from another supplier but Europe and the US spent billions on supporting Ukraine both civilians and military. What did India do besides pocketing all that blood oil money? Nothing. India is not the one to teach us about morals here.

Graspery

Does anyone know if India has a scamming culture?

tragedyy_

India has been raping the US for decades. Any sanctions aren't enough 

Prudent-Energy7412

SS: India’s stock market showed little sign of panic a day after the U.S. announced a 50% tariff on goods from the country and threatened secondary sanctions over its continued oil trade with Russia.

The Sensex, the benchmark index for India’s blue-chip stocks, ended the day around 0.1% higher on Aug. 7.

From bureaucrats to businesses, there’s a broad consensus in India that the latest escalation from the U.S. is only a pressure tactic to fast-track trade talks. However, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi now has something he didn’t have, even a day earlier: the support of the Indian opposition to push back. 

Rahul Gandhi, the leader of India’s largest opposition party, the Indian National Congress, described the penalty for Russian oil purchases as “economic blackmail” by Trump.

Consequently, the Indian negotiators’ resolve may only get stronger, especially in talks over areas that directly affect the country’s farmers.

“India will never compromise on the interests of the country’s farmers, fishermen, and livestock breeders. I know it will cost me personally, but I am ready,” Modi said on Thursday morning, hours after the U.S. increased tariffs.

Mundane-Laugh8562

India has cancelled or at least put on hold the $ 3.8 billion order for 6 additional P-8I maritime patrol aircrafts. This single deal alone is roughly equivalent to 10% of the \~ $ 40 billion annual Indian exports hit by the tariffs.

India's three largest airlines have total of 410 Boeing airplanes on order which have value of $ 70 billion. This in total is the total annual Indian export to USA.

In addition, there is the Stryker deal, the Javelin deal etc. which now will likely not go through.

Sumeru88

Exports to the US is about 18% of India's total exports, but only makes up a bit over 1% of its GDP. These tariffs will not work. The damage is done anyway, decades of India-US relations tossed in weeks.

HarshilBhattDaBomb

India doesn't sell goods to the US, it sells services, services don't have tariffs, Trump's tariff scare tactic won't work on India for this single reason, tariffs might as well be 250% or 1000%, it won't have the same result on India as it would have on countries like Canada or Mexico.

lic2smart

Having seen the China playbook, India hopes the tariffs will go away or put in abeyance until the next round of talks are concluded. The team is arriving in India August 25th- India has supposedly agreed to lower tariffs on most but not on 2 particular categories, Agriculture and Dairy. 

Agriculture and Dairy are the 2 biggest redlines - still a very farming driven economy it needs to safeguard its large farmer base. Unlike the US where farming happens by corporations, India has a much more fragmented system. India is pushing back strongly against the use of GMO crops and the use of dairy where blood meal is involved (majority of Hindus are vegetarians).

hinterstoisser

Is anyone else getting the impression that Trump is acting like an oblivious teenager among adults—thinking everything will return to normal once the trade deal is signed?

Trade comes after national security and strategic interests. What started as a casual tug-of-war has now escalated into a serious confrontation, and Trump doesn’t appear mature enough to grasp that—let alone start working to fix things.

Just with the events of the past week or so, India is re-evaluating its long-term security posture for the next decade in response to these developments.

Trump was clearly chasing a flashy headline from the trade deal, similar to what happened with South Korea on rice and beef. In India's case, he wanted to crack open access to dairy and grain markets.

His attempts to pressure India have been just as immature. First, he seemed to think that cozying up to Pakistan would corner India—evident in a string of Pakistan-related remarks and engagements.

Then suddenly, and seemingly out of nowhere, he played the Russian oil card.
Let’s not forget — Russian oil isn’t under blanket sanctions. Other countries are still buying it without facing consequences, so the issue clearly isn't about purchasing the oil. It's just a pretext for applying pressure.

All the progressive values the West claims to uphold in the 21st century — awareness of gender identity, animal rights, and so on — quickly fall away when dealing with countries that can’t push back (that's what they think, at the moment). It reflects a lingering colonial mindset: suppress those who can’t defend themselves (and they might have miscalculated this time). China isn’t in the same position simply because it holds powerful leverage.

India will remember this episode as yet another chapter in a long history of pressure and double standards from the West.

Edit: Spell

curiousstrider

If the issue is just importing Russian oil/arms, why are there just 15% tariffs on Turkey who does the same?

DeciusCurusProbinus

Trump doesn't realize everyone keeps seeing him back down. TACO is public knowledge. He has lost his leverage.

Cultural-Flow7185

Dull_Conversation669

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Gues they are going to wait it out to see what happens? I don't think the fall tmr will be big all depends on if they go into effect lot of time between now and 21 days

Scholastic_nobody

It would be funny if they ended it with thank you for your attention to this matter

albyeinst

We have stood strong till now we must not back off now no matter what otherwise the US will do the same thing in future for other things also.

[deleted]

Meri ek tang nakli hai... Mai hockey ka bohot bara khiladi tha....

Educational-Lab-2192

Nikhilodeon_

US guys are coming. So they want to get the deal closed. If we close it then all these will be waived off. I think so.

Vatfreeman

No-Sun-6114

Yeah India about to team up with China fr and BRICS influence is about to surge.

Poundcake2Red_Velvet

https://preview.redd.it/rmmywq4yrfhf1.png?width=557&amp;format=png&amp;auto=webp&amp;s=5e679806e4a0075d531d192b8a89b7a52d2dfab3

haseen-sapne

Repulsive-Parsley-94

India will do to US what Netflix did to Broadcom. I don’t make the rules

ManOfCultureAAA

dsouzaenoch

Bhosad_wala

I wonder how the global economies would be moving if that metal gets in the head instead of the ear.

HumanCloud9360

All we need now are nerves of steel, patience and clear-headedness. 

The US is our major market and one that can give us a lot of pain. We have seen sanctions and lived through them. 

Tariffs are a different beast altogether. And as many comment, this can also be turned into a resilience, if we are creative, clever and concrete. 

The Government must seize this opportunity to unite the nation, take advantage of this moment of adversity and forge ahead difficult reforms.

gfxd

Just proves that the supreme leaders 52 inch chest is only for reels and show off

samarth678

Narendra Modi did everything  even made an account on Truth Social and endorsed MAGA, MIGAA, MEGA and at the end of the day, we get slapped with tariffs. Meanwhile, NATO member Turkey keeps buying and faces no sanctions. We need to hold Modi accountable. He owes the nation answers, just like Lula did.

Ok_Background_4323

The only person benefiting from Russian oil is Ambani. Indian government doesn’t lower the petrol/diesel prices because of Russian/Iranian oil. Meanwhile Ambani mints money by refining and selling it to overseas customers.

A common Indian is paying the price to keep Ambani fat and rich.

sigapuit

getitright420

M0therN4ture

the incompetence shows in multiple levels

the form of the response  
the second grade language  
the amateur font  
not a single mention of what our response is

PeeOnYoFace007

Adani ki wajah se tumhari ta#ti nikal rahi hai

markelonn

Agar BJ party ye post kardega to mai account delete kar dunga!

Data-CHOR-365

EyeraGlass

The EU and the US have substantially larger economies than India. The US has an economy more than seven times larger than India. Germany alone has a larger economy than India. Relative to their economy, India is much more reliant on trade with Russia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)

In 2024 India had more trade with Russia than the entire EU. [The source is the literal Indian government.](https://indianembassy-moscow.gov.in/overview.php#:~:text=In%20the%20post%2DSoviet%20era,electrical%20machinery%2C%20and%20surgical%20tools.) India’s trade with Russia is six times the pre-pandemic numbers.

[Whereas EU trade with Russia has drastically fallen.](https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=EU_trade_with_Russia_-_latest_developments)

[US trade with Russia is less than 1/10th the trade that India has.](https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/europe-middle-east/russia-and-eurasia/russia) This is despite the US having an economy over seven times larger than India.

Russia is using their state-owned oil companies to fund the Ukraine war [more info.](https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy2777) There is overwhelming evidence of this. India is helping the Russians to evade sanctions on oil companies. India should be sanctioned for this.

CurtisLeow

India does have a point here, why is oil where we draw the line and not fertilizers? Why is the EU able to plan for years more of gas imports from Russia but India has to cut oil exports off right now?

I'm all for cutting Russia off from the global market, but it does sound a bit hypocritical for EU/america/other Western nations to say that our imports from Russia are critical while India's aren't. Reminds me a lot about how climate change is dealt with where we feel developing countries should switch to green energy and stop deforestation while we slow roll our green shift. 

Remember, we are asking a country whose GDP/capita is just over a tenth of the size of the states to spend more money on oil when the west isn't willing to spend more on fertilizer and uranium.

Consistent-Study-287

Not thrilled with India importing Russian crude, but it’s not like the EU doesn’t import roughly the same amount (of total imports by dollar value).

The biggest importer is China from what I understand.

I don’t really have the same expectations for a third world country that I do for an extremely wealthy region that claims to be threatened by Russia.

One-Suspect5105

I'm a bit conflicted on this issue. If Russian oil doesn't hit international markets it will dramatically drive up the cost of oil globally which will drag down global economic growth and push up inflation. Even if it was possible to block all Russian oil from reaching international markets it seems like it would be a very costly way of stopping Russia.

The far far cheaper and faster way is to just give Ukraine the weapons they need to win. The Russian forces are badly weakened and they've suffered massive personnel and equipment losses. They've basically abandoned tank/armored vehicle assaults because they've largely run out while artillery shells fired by Russia are orders of magnitude lower than earlier in the war. We're now at the point where another big US aid package combined with the aid coming from Europe would probably be enough to permanently tilt the balance away from Russia (assuming Ukraine can use it to access whatever conventional weapons they need and those don't have geographic restrictions). 

The fastest way for Ukraine to win is to just get more weapons. Expanding sanctions on critical components for Russian industry would also help and more aggressively targeting loop holes. I don't think a tariff on India for buying Russian oil is necessarily a bad thing but I don't think it will noticeably impact the war. JASSMs, ATACMS, Patriots, fighter jets and shells will noticably impact the war.

socialistrob

Btw, there are NO tariffs on Russian oil. It's pure cronyism through and through. If India was able to produce its own oil, they would tariff it. The politicians dress it up in various guises such as national security, but in the end of the day, tariffs literally only exist cause their friends who own car companies, internet companies, and various other companies don't want to face any competition.

TheBiggestNoob420

It feels so weird to see a foreign country griping about being bullied by Trump and... and feel no sympathy for them.

"Just add tariffs" may be Trump's knee-jerk technique applying pressure, but for once he's actually applying it for a good reason.

I'd love to see "we'll invest the tariff revenues in solar projects in India so you can quit buying oil from scuzzballs once and for all."

gnurdette

you know it’s bad when the third world country is making reasonable and specific points instead of vague hyperbole about racist eurocentric western hegemonic bullying

Umang_Malik

This is scarcely the point but why does this look like something out of a video game from the early 2000s

jamiebond

India imports about 1.76 million barrels per day of crude oil from Russia.  Is there another source that even has this much spare capacity?  What would happen to the global crude oil price to increase the demand for non-Russian oil???  We are talking about a massive spike in global oil pricing which of course leads to massive inflation.

Pattonator70

India is actively helping Russia evade sanctions. This isn't neutrality but actively helping an Aggresor which poses an existential threat to the EU.  India is insane to think they wouldn't eventually get sanctioned for this. 

Congrats to the advisor trying their best to trick Trump into decent foreign policy decisions

Maimai_Bube

The trade that has managed to continue around this war astounds me. EU importing fertilizer, and gas, USA importing uranium etc. Crazier is that Russia continued its important exports to the west for so long. Also crazy how Ukraine basically was okay with all of this allowing even pipelines in their own nation to continue to ship fertilizer to the EU (this is partly why I was so skeptical of the nord stream one pipeline incident being from ukraine).

Basically the-nothing-ever-happens-bros, No one wants things to change or happen and so they will try to keep up normalcy until the last possible minute.

edit: at this point it would not surprise me if, when the Taiwan straight conflict kicks off, there is some wierd gentleman's agreement to allow chips to continue to be exported while Chinese and American forces butcher each other.

1ivesomelearnsome

Very big on the specifics of why India doesn't like it, and very vague on what they are going to do about it.

gilead117

    7. We refer you to the reply given in the case of Arkell v Pressdram

remainderrejoinder

Eastern-Job3263

Did Trump threaten to tariff India unless they reduce trade with Russia? If so, based.

namey-name-name

It's fairly clear that the amount of trade between Russia and the West and Russia and India are moving in dramatically directions. I am all for free trade but it's clear that India increasing its trade with Russia has negative externalities for the US and Europe and it makes sense to take action to minimize those. That's not hypocrisy, that is a basic policy prescription for a serious national security problem.

Due_Search_8040

India is preparing a support package for exporters impacted by the recent 50% tariffs imposed by the US, aiming to mitigate losses in several sectors.

India's Trade Response to US Tariffs

Why This Matters

Public Sentiment Summary

Highlighted Comments

Parties Involved

What the people want