Full transcript of Piyush Goyal interview at Rising Bharat Summit

Union Home Minister Piyush Goyal addressed the Rising Bharat Summit on April 9.

Interviewer: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, we are calling this session reshaping destinies preparing for a glorious tomorrow. A lot of people say your destiny is in your hand, but increasingly it looks tough. It depends on a lot of factors that you cannot control, like which side of the bed did Donald Trump get up from? How fast is climate change coming for us? How soon are the wars in Europe and West Asia ending? So there's a fair bit of uncertainty and the question is, how will India navigate this? To get some answers, we have with us a very special guest, Union Commerce Minister, Shri Piyush Goyal Ji. Piyush Ji, good evening, welcome to Rising Bharat. It's Wednesday, Trump tariffs have kicked in, markets are volatile, recession fears loom. What is India's strategy, sir?

Piyush Goyal: Thank you. I think we've all seen the way Prime Minister Modi has deftly managed the entire situation. He was very cognizant of the impending possibilities. He was first off the block in building back his old friendship and relationship with President Trump. They both jointly declared that the US and India are trusted partners and we will work towards a bilateral trade agreement by fall of 2025 to ensure that our relationship, our friendship and our ongoing partnership, not only in trade, but in so many areas, geopolitical, defence. We have a very strategic relationship with the US and I think it's only got reinforced since President Trump has come in. I think our strategy is very clear, we are engaged with the US. Incidentally, we are right up front in the queue because we started early, Prime Minister Modi had the foresight to recognize the crisis and as is his wont, we have seen it in history over the last 11 years, every crisis has been converted into an opportunity for India.

Interviewer: We hope this one is too and you've been at the forefront of the conversations and you've engaged with the Americans and your counterparts in Washington DC. What have they told you? What is their primary concern? Is it the trade surplus or is it the high tariffs? What do they want to fix?

Piyush Goyal: I think we must recognize that this problem that the US is facing is not particularly directed towards India. The whole issue is about fair trade and that's something India has been very vocal about for the last 10 years. I recently shared with an audience that we have to go to the root of the issue. The genesis of this problem emanates from the entry of China into the WTO about 30 years ago when they approached the WTO and then they were admitted as a full-time member with all the privileges of most favored nation status which means, in common words, that we cannot have differential tariffs for different nations and therefore whatever is the tariff a country imposes on country A has to be the same from country A to Z unless we have a bilateral trade agreement or a free trade agreement.

Now I think we have suffered over the years tremendously. I don't know what agreement the Congress Party signed with the Communist Party of China during the UPA government but post that we saw the trade deficit with China grow by leaps and bounds. And India and Indian manufacturers, Indian industry, Indian trade suffered massively.

Similarly, the US has suffered massive trade deficits because of the non-market economy that is China, because of their predatory pricing or unfair trade practices and I think the United States is trying to reset the rules of the game and in some sense it's a good omen for India because it opens up huge opportunities. I've just come in Palki to your program straight from an interaction with all the sectoral export promotion councils and I must tell you, except one or two, everybody is very excited. They see good potential going forward. They're supporting our engagement with the US and together they and us will convert this into a great business opportunity.

Interviewer: Right, fair point. And I did see that comment about China's unfair economic rise earlier and by that logic Trump is taking the fight to China but in the last decade then our trade deficit with China has crossed a hundred billion dollars. So what are we doing to fix the imbalance?

Piyush Goyal: Incidentally, the exponential growth that happened in the UPA time was about 25x. So a small trade deficit from a billion or a billion and a half increased to almost 35 odd billion dollars. Now once you have weakened Indian industry, once you have killed for example our KSM and the important ingredients that go into making our pharma industry the pharmacy of the world, we become dependent on China for these materials, for many items and then it takes a long time to get all of that back, re-shored into India.

We have been working through projects like the product linked incentive scheme where 1,97,000 crores has been given to different sectors. Our Semicon project where the semiconductor industry and its ecosystem is getting 75,000 crores. We have recently announced that we'll come out with a scheme for the toys and the footwear sector.

Two days back the cabinet decision was announced, I think probably on Friday last week, three days back, that we are going to offer 22,000 crores for the electronics component manufacturers to support them to manufacture high quality inputs in India. So it's a continuous process to promote manufacturing, to get industry in India to replace a lot of goods which have become a part of our supply chains and wherever we see dumping or predatory pricing from products coming in from China, the government acts proactively. We have the Director General of Trade Remedies acting on any request that sector's industry puts up to us.

We have the industry ministry working with the different sectors to protect any irrational pricing. So it's an ongoing effort and our growth of the deficit during our 10 years compared to the 25x plus that grew in the 10 years of UPA is possibly only 3x or so.

Interviewer: I'll come to the China point in a bit and I know there's a political reset as well but coming back to the Trump tariffs, I'm sure you had some calculation before the tariffs were announced. Was 26% closer to your best case scenario or worst case scenario?

Piyush Goyal: I think the tariffs have been determined based on a formula which is the trade deficit that the US has with a particular country divided by the total imports into the US from that country.

Interviewer: What do you make of that formula though? You're a chartered accountant yourself.

Piyush Goyal: I would not like to comment on a formula that's used by the United States. Based on that formula they've come up with different tariffs for different countries. We believe that India was not one of those countries which really needed to have tariffs on them because we were already in engagement for a bilateral trade deal. But I think the US has not differentiated. For every country they've come out with a number. But we are in constant engagement and I think we'll be working with them to take off these additional tariffs in the days to come.

Interviewer: And India has a better deal than some of the other players in the region.

Piyush Goyal: And we are much faster off the block compared to the others.

Interviewer: I think the strategy at the moment focuses on the trade deal that we're working towards. If for some reason it does not happen by the end of this year, what is the plan B or is plan B to make plan A work?

Piyush Goyal: Well I think this is another area where I'd like to quote from your past experience. Look at COVID. The challenges were many. Solutions were experimented with very often. If you recall the oxygen was a big crisis. We had only 900 metric tons of medical oxygen being produced a day. We needed 10 times that amount. But Prime Minister Modi through deft handling of the entire ecosystem that could produce oxygen actually achieved not only the production of medical oxygen grow to 10 or 11,000 tons a day, but the bigger problem of logistics of moving this large quantity was also resolved. We had to send empty containers, ISO containers by air force planes to save time and move the finished or filled up containers to railway. And we did that on literally on real time overnight basis. Like that I can recount 50 examples during COVID. There's always plan A, plan B, plan C, but we succeed in whatever we take up. We will succeed here.

Look at the Ukraine-Russia war. Many people criticized Prime Minister Modi that why are you not taking sides one way or the other? But look at the situation today. The world is recognizing and respecting Prime Minister Modi's astute handling of the war between Ukraine and Russia.

Interviewer: It's very interesting.

Piyush Goyal: We never took sides. We balanced our relationship. We worked towards diplomacy and dialogue leading to peace. And the whole world realizes today that that was the right path. And the only way this crisis could be resolved. And I would add to that. There was a crisis of oil imports, crude oil imports into the country. Now just imagine, Palki, and you understand economics a little bit. I see your vantage program quite often. Friends, just try to imagine if India did not import the crude oil that we got from Russia and we were standing in the international market with our requirement, and our requirement is not small. We import between three and four million barrels a day.

Three or four million barrels a day is our requirement. We don't have enough domestic oil. Now if we were standing in the market to buy that kind of that level of crude oil, the price of oil for the whole world would have increased to probably $300 per barrel. Thanks to India importing oil from Russia in large measure, we were able to bring stability to the crude oil prices, the benefit of which the entire world enjoyed. The entire world could protect themselves from inflation. That is the way Prime Minister Modi thinks in advance of what the others can think. So he's always two steps ahead.  And I think the world, as Dr. Jaishankar rightly said, the world should send a thank you note to Prime Minister Modi for saving the whole world from this oil crisis that could have happened.

Interviewer: President Trump has said that India is going to substantially reduce tariffs, and I know that we've made some moves with American whiskey and high-end bikes and so on. But have you also spelled out some red lines that these are the no-go zones where we shall not entertain American demands?

Piyush Goyal: Palki, we always look at India's interests. For us, it is India first. Our goal of making India a developed and prosperous nation by 2047 is paramount in our mind when we are engaged with any country, the US, the EU, UK, New Zealand, Chile, Peru, Oman, we are working on several free trade agreements bilaterally with developed nations with whom we have no competition, but who can add to our economic prosperity. And in each of them, India's interests are paramount. So obviously, we take care of what India needs and what is good for India. But every trade deal is a win-win for both sides. And it involves negotiations. We never negotiate on the platform of a news channel. Negotiations are behind closed doors. And there's a lot of give and take that happens. But the final outcome will always be in India's interests. That assurance I can give to all Indian countrymen. And the proof of the story lies in the past. We did an FTA with Mauritius. We did an FTA with Australia. We did the ECTA agreement, Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement. We did an FTA with the UAE, the world's fastest ever negotiated FTA. We did an FTA with the four ECTA countries, Switzerland, Iceland, Norway, and Liechtenstein.

All of these agreements with extensive stakeholder consultations. Even News 18 could not find any fault with those free trade agreements. So our free trade agreements under the Modi government, guided by Prime Minister Modi's principles of India first, are always in the best interests of India and 140 crore Indians.

Interviewer: Piyush Ji, have you heard the Gen Z term, truth bombs? It's what you dropped a few days back about Indian startups. Why did you choose to drop the truth bomb and why now?

Piyush Goyal: First of all, let me tell you, it was not a truth bomb. It was an appeal to India's talent. And we have huge talent in India. We are the people who provide talent to the world. Our skills, our STEM graduates. And by the way, we produce the highest number of STEM graduates in India, 43% of whom are women. STEM is Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. 43% of our STEM graduates are women.

Our talent has huge potential. They've done some wonderful work over the last nine years since Prime Minister Modi launched Startup India. They've grown from 400 startups to nearly 170,000 plus startups. There's always a moment in history when you now look for the next level of growth. You aspire for bigger and better. And that needs a little bit of jogging of the true potential of India.

And I was only trying to show the mirror to our young men and women, show them the huge potential that India has, that each one of our youngsters has, and encourage them to dream big, to aspire big. Because as Prime Minister Modi often says, unless we dream big, unless we look for very big targets, we will never achieve that. And I think that was the simple effort I tried to do. But I must share with you, by and large, I did an analysis of the entire social media, which was abuzz with the comments of the news channels. And I found there was a very small ecosystem. Almost all the Congress handles, obviously, they are the culprits, one would imagine. But I saw that, I got my office to analyze all those news, all those handles on Twitter, on Insta, on Facebook, were critical of my comments. Save and accept three, four people. They were all a part of an ecosystem that has been bashing the Modi government on every single opportunity they got.

I can share that report one day in public. It will be an eye-opener for all my young friends to see how the Congress party and its ecosystem doesn't wish to see our startups engage with modern technology, engage with the best in the world, have big aspirations, big targets. And on the other hand, even Aman Gupta of Shark Tank, I saw a lot of comments by very reputed founders, very reputed startup companies, welcoming the call to action for our youngsters to aspire to achieve big targets. You remember Chandrayaan?

Interviewer: Yes.

Piyush Goyal: We didn't succeed the first time and we did try to do the lunar landing on the south pole of the moon. Prime Minister Modi was right there, encouraging the young scientists, encouraging the team. Many women there. Encouraging them, don't lose hope. I think it was Dr. Sivan at that time. Encouraging them, we have to succeed. We will succeed as a nation. And lo and behold, second time around, we are the first country in the world to do the lunar landing at the south pole. We need to encourage our scientists. We need to encourage our people. They have the potential. And that's what I tried to do.

Interviewer: No, and I agree. It was a positive provocation, if I may, and it's important to have tough conversations to grow as a country. And new ideas, especially the ones in technologically advanced spaces, require a strong platform to build on. And that is also a challenge that we as a country need to overcome because that platform is usually typically provided by a government. I was looking at a report that said that we spend, what, 0.6% of our GDP on R&D, research and development. China spends 2.4%. The US spends more than 3%. Would you say that successive governments have failed to create the right environment and launchpad for young entrepreneurs to really take off?

Piyush Goyal: It's the story of the water in this glass. It's half full and half empty. A number of initiatives have been taken. A number of initiatives are on the anvil. A number of initiatives are already on the table. Let me share two or three things. Our startups have done us proud with a huge amount of good things that have come out. In fact, we had the startup park at this very venue, Bharat Mandapam. In my 11 years as a minister, I've never been to any program. All three days. But I came here all three days. It was so exciting. And the work that I saw here, the deep techs, the agri-techs, the agro-techs, some of the innovative fintech work. There was some fantastic work. What I saw encouraged me to think bigger. And I think it will encourage thousands. We had a footfall of 30,000 in Startup Mahakum first edition last year. We had estimated we'll have about a lakh of people coming this time. You know, we crossed 2,30,000. Almost 9.5X in the Startup Mahakum. Out of the 3,000 exhibitors, 1,500 technology-based entrepreneurs, we gave them space free of charge, encouraging them to come here and showcase their technology products.

We did a Maharati, a challenge for the technology-oriented startups, where we gave 70 crores worth of grants. No equity, no loan, nothing. Grants. To all those who came up with good ideas. And I gave out some of those awards. You know, they were from places like Badayo, from Odisha, from Bihar, from Sikkim, from Guwahati, all over the country. Now we are coming out with Startup Fund of Fund second edition. Another 10,000 crores. And I've asked (0:22:02 inaudible), who monitors it, to promote more of the tech-based, deep tech-based, AI-based startups. Take more grant-based funding or less equity. Allow the founders to enjoy the equity. If they do well, allow them to claw back, claw back their equity. We are coming out with a 1 lakh crore, Anusandhan NRF, National Research Foundation, a fund of 1 lakh crores to promote research in a public-private academia partnership. And that 1 lakh can be equivalent to 10 lakh crores of funding for R&D. Because our R&D is at one-tenth the cost of US or Switzerland. So there are many more initiatives. Time is up. I can assure all the viewers of Network 18 and its channels across the length and breadth of the country. Modiji's government is with all of you. Go for it. Innovate in India. The country stands behind you. Thank you.