US President Donald Trump on Tuesday reiterated his threat to "substantially" increase the tariffs on Indian imports, saying he would do so within the next 24 hours.
"India has not been a good trading partner, because they do a lot of business with us, but we don't do business with them. So we settled on 25 percent but I think I'm going to raise that very substantially over the next 24 hours, because they're buying Russian oil," he said in a televised interview to CNBC.
“Now I will say this, India went from the highest tariffs ever, they will give us zero tariffs….But that’s not good enough, because of what they’re doing with oil,” he added.
The fresh rhetoric by Trump comes a day after he threatened India with tariff hike, citing the country's purchase of Russian oil. He said india was "buying massive amounts of Russian oil" and selling it for "big profits."
"They don't care how many people in Ukraine are being killed by the Russian War Machine," Trump added on Monday.
Hitting back, India mounted an unusually sharp counterattack on the US and the European Union for their "unjustified and unreasonable" targeting of New Delhi for its procurement of Russian crude oil.
Firmly rejecting the criticism, India pointed out the double standards in targeting it on the issue and said both the US and the EU are continuing their trade relations with Russia.
"Unlike our case, such trade is not even a vital national compulsion," the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said on Monday evening.
The Europe-Russia trade includes not just energy, but also fertilizers, mining products, chemicals, iron and steel, and machinery and transport equipment, the MEA said in the statement.
Last week, Trump threatened a minimum 25% tariff on goods coming from India, set to take effect at the end of this week. Indian goods are currently subject to a 10% minimum rate. Trump did not specify what new tariff rate goods from India could be charged if it continues to purchase Russian oil.
These announcements are being seen as a pressure tactic to get New Delhi to agree to demands made by the US in the proposed trade agreement with India. The US is seeking duty concessions for its agriculture, dairy and genetically modified (GM) foods. India is against giving any concessions in these sectors as they involve the livelihood of millions of small and marginalised farmers.
New Delhi has said that it is studying the implications of these tariffs and is still hopeful of concluding a fair, balanced and mutually beneficial trade agreement.
So far five rounds of negotiations have been held between the two countries. For the next round of talks, the US team is coming to India on August 25. The talks will go on till August 29.
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