{"id":46306,"date":"2026-01-26T17:14:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-26T11:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/2026\/01\/26\/the-136b-question-india-eu-free-trade-agreement-near-closure-after-17-years\/"},"modified":"2026-01-26T17:14:00","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T11:44:00","slug":"the-136b-question-india-eu-free-trade-agreement-near-closure-after-17-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/2026\/01\/26\/the-136b-question-india-eu-free-trade-agreement-near-closure-after-17-years\/","title":{"rendered":"The $136B Question: India EU Free Trade Agreement Near Closure After 17 Years"},"content":{"rendered":"
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New Delhi [India], January 26: <\/b>This story refused to end for years. Now it\u2019s cornered. The India EU Free Trade Agreement is finally being treated like something real.<\/span><\/p>\n

Start with the optics. Delhi. Republic Day afterglow. Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosting European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa. That alone sets the temperature.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the substance matters more.<\/span><\/p>\n

An announcement signalling the conclusion of talks on the India EU Free Trade Agreement is expected to anchor the summit. Not buried. Not vague. Front and centre. Alongside it, a strategic defence pact and a mobility framework that quietly says more than the speeches will.<\/span><\/p>\n

Von der Leyen didn\u2019t hedge. \u201cA successful India makes the world more stable, prosperous and secure.\u201d That line wasn\u2019t crafted for poetry. It was admission.<\/span><\/p>\n

Europe has recalculated.<\/span><\/p>\n

The India EU Free Trade Agreement began in 2007, back when optimism came cheap. Then it stalled. By 2013, ambition gaps were blamed. Translation: nobody wanted to bend first. The file gathered dust for nearly a decade.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then June 2022 cracked it open again.<\/span><\/p>\n

This time, the tone shifted. Less sermonising. Fewer red lines shouted across tables. More spreadsheets. More supply chains. More uncomfortable honesty about dependence, resilience, and who can actually deliver when systems wobble.<\/span><\/p>\n

That wobble is now permanent.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trade numbers don\u2019t whisper anymore. They announce themselves. The European Union is India\u2019s largest trading partner in goods. In FY 2024\u201325, total goods trade hit about USD 136 billion. India exported roughly USD 76 billion. Imports landed near USD 60 billion.<\/span><\/p>\n

That scale rewires priorities.<\/span><\/p>\n

The India EU Free Trade Agreement is expected to change texture, not just totals.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Tariffs matter, sure. So do standards, market access, regulatory friction, and the ability to move faster without asking permission every quarter.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is not romance. It\u2019s plumbing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trade, though, is only the loudest piece.<\/span><\/p>\n

Defence cooperation has stepped out of the shadows. A proposed Security and Defence Partnership is set to be unveiled at the summit. Officials talk about interoperability. About trust. About aligning capabilities rather than duplicating them.<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a sharper edge underneath.<\/span><\/p>\n

The partnership opens doors for Indian firms to participate in the EU\u2019s SAFE programme. SAFE. Security Action for Europe. A Euro 150 billion financial instrument designed to accelerate defence readiness.<\/span><\/p>\n

That money isn\u2019t theoretical. It\u2019s already allocated. Europe wants speed. India offers scale and cost discipline. This isn\u2019t charity. It\u2019s mutual convenience, dressed in strategy.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then comes the Security of Information Agreement. Dry name. Serious consequences. Without SOIA, industrial defence cooperation stays shallow. With it, joint projects become possible. Quietly. Efficiently.<\/span><\/p>\n

No applause required.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mobility, though, will get the headlines. A memorandum of understanding to facilitate the movement of Indian workers to Europe is expected as another summit outcome. It creates a framework. Nothing dramatic. Nothing reckless.<\/span><\/p>\n

France, Germany, and Italy already have migration and mobility partnerships with India. This just broadens the map.<\/span><\/p>\n

Europe has ageing populations and labour gaps it no longer hides. India has people. Skills. Ambition. The debate on that equation is over.<\/span><\/p>\n

Beyond these pillars, the agenda sprawls deliberately. Climate change. Critical technologies. Rules-based order. Familiar phrases, yes. But the context has hardened.<\/span><\/p>\n

Washington\u2019s trade and security posture forced Europe to rethink old dependencies. India watched closely. Then negotiated accordingly.<\/span><\/p>\n

India and the European Union have been strategic partners since 2004. For years, that label felt ceremonial. It doesn\u2019t now.<\/span><\/p>\n

Global tensions will surface at the table. The Russia-Ukraine war will be discussed. European officials have made their stance clear. President Costa is expected to call it an existential threat and a challenge to the rules-based international order, with ripple effects beyond Europe.<\/span><\/p>\n

India\u2019s view is stable. Strategic autonomy. Dialogue. Balance. No theatre.<\/span><\/p>\n

They don\u2019t agree on everything. Nobody pretends they do anymore. What they share is a core interest in stability that doesn\u2019t collapse into dependency or drift.<\/span><\/p>\n

The<\/span> India EU Free Trade Agreement <\/a><\/strong>sits at the centre of that shared interest. Not as a trophy. As ballast.<\/span><\/p>\n

Read More<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New Delhi [India], January 26: This story refused to end for years. Now it\u2019s cornered. The India EU Free Trade Agreement is finally being treated like something real. Start with the optics. Delhi. Republic Day afterglow. Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosting European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa. That…<\/p>\n

Read More “The $136B Question: India EU Free Trade Agreement Near Closure After 17 Years”<\/span> »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46307,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[635],"class_list":["post-46306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national","tag-national"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46306\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailynewsindia.co.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}