| Subject: | International Relations \ Economics |
| Title: | India-US Interim Trade Deal (2026): Recalibrating Economic Partnership in a Fragmented Global Order |
| Author(s): | Bhudev |
| Published on: | 30th April 2026 |
| Published by: | Lyceum India |
| Name of the Journal: | Lyceum India Journal of Social Sciences |
| ISSN/E-ISSN: | 3048-6513 |
| Volume & Issue: | Volume: 3, Issue: 5 |
| Pages: | 110-117 |
| Original DOI (if any): | 10.5281/zenodo.19690309 |
| Repository DOI: | |
| Abstract: | The India-US Interim Trade Deal of 2026 could well encapsulate this critical juncture in the course of bilateral economic relations from episodic bouts of trade frictions to a paradigm characterised by structured and strategic engagement. This paper contextualizes the agreement within processes of global economic restructuring, the impact of geopolitical competition and changing structure of diplomacy. The deal brings about a major tariff rationalisation and improved market access, along with commitments to reduce or eliminate non-tariff barriers, offering better trade facilitation between the two economies. At a more fundamental level, the pact signifies an output from Indian and American strategic interests that are increasingly heading in the same directions in relation to both the Indo-Pacific as well as critical and emerging technologies. But the deal also brings up key issues of trade asymmetry, inherent domestic sectoral vulnerabilities as well as broader and longer-term implications for India’s strategic autonomy. This paper maintains that the interim trade agreement is to be interpreted as a transitory framework, that is, it is not only a framework that seeks to address the urgent trade issues but also a framework that prepares the way to a full bilateral trade agreement. By doing so it is helped to bring the wider change of the India-US relations into a multidimensional relationship that is becoming more and more central to the global economic and strategic order. |
| Keywords: | India-US relations, Interim Trade Deal 2026, economic diplomacy, tariff liberalization, global supply chains, Indo-Pacific strategy. |
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