{"id":28942,"date":"2025-08-15T13:56:26","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T08:11:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/?p=28942"},"modified":"2025-08-15T13:56:26","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T08:11:26","slug":"facing-us-tariffs-indias-modi-vows-self-reliance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/facing-us-tariffs-indias-modi-vows-self-reliance\/","title":{"rendered":"Facing US tariffs, India’s Modi vows self-reliance"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Friday that India is seeking self-reliance with energy independence and the development of its own powerful defence systems, vowing to defend his country’s interests “like a wall”.<\/p>\n

Modi delivered his annual Independence Day address from the imposing ramparts of Red Fort in New Delhi at a time when India faces intense pressure and threats of additional tariffs from the United States.<\/p>\n

“Self-reliance is the foundation of developed India,” Modi said after a flypast of military helicopters scattered flower petals above an invited crowd of thousands.<\/p>\n

“Freedom becomes meaningless if someone becomes too dependent on others”.<\/p>\n

Ties between New Delhi and Washington have been strained by Trump’s ultimatum for India to end its purchases of Russian oil, a key source of revenue for Moscow as it wages its military offensive in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

India has said it “stands ready” to support efforts to end the Ukraine war and endorses a summit to be held between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday.<\/p>\n

But the United States says it will double new import tariffs on India from 25 percent to 50 percent by August 27 if New Delhi does not switch crude suppliers.<\/p>\n

“We know that we remain dependent on many countries to meet our energy needs”, said Modi, leader of the world’s most populous nation and its fifth-biggest economy.<\/p>\n

“But to build a truly self-reliant India, we must achieve energy independence.”<\/p>\n

Modi urged scientists and engineers to focus on building key sectors and technologies including fighter jet engines, semiconductor chips and military hardware systems.<\/p>\n

“We will have India-made semiconductor chips in the market by the year’s end,” Modi said.<\/p>\n

He added that the country was also working towards building its own space station and would have a “defence shield” in the next decade, without giving further details.<\/p>\n

Modi also honoured the Indian armed forces, who took part in a four-day conflict with arch-rival Pakistan, which ended in a ceasefire on May 10.<\/p>\n

He did not speak directly about Trump, but said he would “stand like a wall” against any policy that hurts the interests of farmers.<\/p>\n

Agriculture employs vast numbers of people in India and has been a key sticking point in trade negotiations.<\/p>\n

“When economic selfishness is rising day by day… we must not just sit and worry about the crisis but instead focus on our strengths,” Modi said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Friday that India is seeking self-reliance with energy independence and the development of its own powerful defence systems, vowing to defend his country’s interests “like a wall”. Modi delivered his annual Independence Day address from the imposing ramparts of Red Fort in New Delhi at a time when India faces […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28943,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28942"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28942"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28942\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28944,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28942\/revisions\/28944"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}