Scindia slams Rahul Gandhi over ‘Bharat Mata sold’ remark on India-US trade deal: ‘Country has no place for you…’

Scindia was speaking at the News18 Rising Bharat Summit 2026

Responding to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s charge that the government has “sold Bharat Mata” through the India-US interim trade deal, union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said the country had no place for him.

Scindia was speaking at the News18 Rising Bharat Summit 2026 in conversation with Moneycontrol managing editor Dr Nalin Mehta.

“If you are so anti your own country, then this country has no place for you,” he said.

Earlier, addressing the Parliament, Rahul Gandhi had said that he does not believe that any Indian prime minister, including Narendra Modi, would agree to such a deal unless there is a “chokehold” on him.

Gandhi said that had an INDIA bloc government negotiated the trade agreement with the US, it would have told President Donald Trump that he should treat India as an equal.

The Congress leader also claimed that through this deal, the interests of farmers have been compromised, textiles have been wiped out, and energy security has been “handed over” to the US.

“This is a wholesale surrender,” he alleged.

“It is a tragedy because it is not just a surrender of the PM; he has surrendered the future of 1.5 billion Indians. He has surrendered because he wanted to protect the BJP’s financial architecture on which there is a case in the US,” Gandhi said.

A 25 per cent reciprocal tariff rate was imposed on India by the United States in August 2025. Later, an additional 25 per cent duty was imposed for buying Russian crude oil, taking the total tariffs on India to 50 per cent.

India and the US, earlier this month, agreed on a framework to finalise an interim trade deal, under which Washington will cut down the tariffs to 18 per cent. Following this, the Congress leader charged the government of surrendering before the Trump administration.

Recently, the US Supreme Court ruled that the tariffs imposed by Trump on nations around the world were illegal and that the president had exceeded his authority when he imposed the sweeping levies by using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) of 1977.