Over the past six months, India has orchestrated one of the most consequential sequences of trade agreements in its recent economic history. In late July 2025, it sealed a landmark deal with the United Kingdom. In mid-December, it secured agreements with Oman and, most recently, with New Zealand. Then, on 27 January 2026, as the ink was drying on the European Union’s reciprocal tariff threats against Washington itself, India and the EU announced the conclusion of nearly two decades of negotiations, finalising what Prime Minister Narendra Modi has termed “the mother of all deals."

The Modi government did not move out of desperation to sign these agreements. India negotiated hard on each, extracting substantial concessions, duty-free access for 99 per cent of its exports to the United Kingdom, zero-duty entry into New Zealand’s market, and meaningful tariff cuts across the European Union.

The India-EU Free Trade Agreement sits at the centre of this strategic repositioning. After stalling for nearly a decade, negotiations began in 2007, paused in 2013 amid disagreements over automobiles, intellectual property, and agriculture, and resumed seriously only after 2020 and accelerated dramatically through 2025. The recent push to a conclusion, negotiated across 14 formal rounds and countless working sessions, culminated in a comprehensive accord covering twenty-four........

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