BHARATA BHARATI

Instead of pretending to be a world-beater, entirely self-sufficient, isn’t it time to sing a different tune and mend fences with Trump? In the present context, conciliation signals strength, not loss of sovereignty. – Makarand R. Paranjape

Indians simply cannot get enough of Donald Trump. Throughout his immensely fractious and intensely vituperative election campaign back to the White House, many Indians, especially from the so-called right wing, supported him vociferously, even raucously. Even though the other contender, Kamala Harris, was a lady, that too half-Indian.

Now, it would seem, the pendulum has swung to the other extreme. There is scarcely a member of India’s ever-expanding commentariat and influencer set who has a kind word to say about the US president. He has become not only the favourite whipping boy, but also the butt of ridicule among the same lot who, until just the other day, were singing hosannas to him.

Today, faced with stiff tariffs and possibly even harsher measures to come, isn’t it time we take a re-look—not just at Trump, but our relationship with the US? First things first: we must understand that Trump, far from being a statesman, is not even a conventional politician. A notoriously self-proclaimed outsider to Washington politics, he is the greatest disrupter that certainly the US, and possibly the world, has known in the past half-century.

What this means is that he doesn’t really care about what we in India think or say about him. Why, not just us, he doesn’t care about what the US mainstream media spews against himeither. CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, CNBC, Reuters, Bloomberg, Al Jazeera, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Time magazine, The Atlantic and so on, to name some detractors, carried out a relentless crusade against him during the presidential race, which shows no signs of abating to this day. But Trump has survived, even thrived. For he is not only a disrupter, but also a fighter, as his famous attempted assassination photograph, now immortalised as a painting in the White House, so vividly symbolises.

The narrative that Trump is an egomaniac who wants the Nobel Peace Prize shouldn’t bother us. If it is true, why didn’t we massage his ego? Or, for that matter, be the first ones to nominate him for the Nobel—something we can still do? Are megalomania or credit-hogging solely Trump’s follies? After all, isn’t it true that strong men—whether Trump, Xi, Putin, or those closer home—share similar qualities and characteristics? However much we may dislike Trump, the reality that we, as a nation, are far less powerful militarily and economically than the US, China or, for that matter, Russia cannot be wished away.

We are quick to take offence, something that I have called “thin-skinned nationalism”, as opposed to our neighbour to the east’s “thick-skinned” variety. If Trump doesn’t really care what we think, what good will it do to rail against him as an unruly bully? We should, instead, calculate how much we lose by acting exaggeratedly defiant or deeply hurt in turns. No matter how much we deny it, tariffs can and will hurt us. Just this evening, at a “chai pe charcha” at one of the capital’s still-popular watering holes, I heard a publisher lamenting that even sending out small parcels of books to fulfil US orders is going to be unprofitable. The forecast for India’s forward earnings has already been reduced by 1.2 percent by agencies such as the London Stock Exchange.

Small or big, our exports to the US will be hit. If, in addition to goods, services come under the purview of Trump’s tariffs, the biggest casualty will be our number one export—software and IT services. In addition, of course, to pharma, gems, and textiles.

The argument that India is protecting its farmers and consumers from genetically modified crops or “non-vegetarian milk” is also not entirely convincing. We can certainly work out a deal that doesn’t include these two. Rather, what is needed is an acknowledgement that we might have misread the US and Trump. Perhaps, the real issue lies elsewhere, including our trade surplus of over $40 billion with the US and our import of cheap oil from Russia.

My point is simple: there is a limit to our playing the swing game, the special advantage in being the world’s major balancing state and rising power. This may be a great position to occupy, but only as long as you don’t over-game, let alone abuse, its privileges. For, there is every likelihood of the big boys—whether it is the US, China, or Russia—making deals with each other at our expense. We need to tread carefully in these dangerous waters rather than upping the ante.

Many months ago, I coined the phrase “China envy” to describe how the Indian leadership sometimes functions. It seems as if they long for the one-party-one-leader absolutist style of governance so alien to India’s immense regional and cultural diversity. The obsession to control not only mainstream politics but also civil society, like China, would not, I argued, serve the Indian democratic system well. Instead, good ideas, including constructive criticism with an ever-widening range of expertise and consultation might produce better results. As would the cultivation, rather than subversion, of second and third-tier leadership in the ruling party. You cannot talk about India’s diversity dividend while simultaneously wanting to impose uniformity in the name of unity across the country and society.

If China envy is one of our problems, then I think it is time to coin another phrase to describe our difficulties, especially exacerbated under Trump. Let us call this our “America complex”. What do I mean by that? Simply speaking, we are a parliamentary democracy whose leadership longs for presidential-style powers. But in the present context, it simply means that the US president commands authority unimaginable in other democracies. India, therefore, needs not only to acknowledge him but also the powers—whether economic, military, technological, or otherwise—of the country he represents, the US.

After all, isn’t humility a virtue according to Sanatana Dharma—”vidya dadati vinayam”? It is in India’s interest to climb down a few notches and eat humble pie if necessary. Instead of pretending to be a world-beater, entirely self-sufficient, isn’t it time to sing a different tune and mend fences? In the present context, conciliation signals strength, not loss of sovereignty. – The New Indian Express, 23 Aigust 2025

› Prof. Makarand R. Paranjape is an Indian novelist and poet, a former director at Indian Institute of Advanced Study (IIAS), Shimla, and former professor of English at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own.