Trump Says India Offered Tariff-Free Imports, Asks Apple Not To Increase Production In India

Chennai: US President Donald Trump has said that India has offered to drop all tariffs on goods imported from his country, while the Indian side claims that it could be 90 per cent of goods, excluding some agricultural products and automobiles. Trump also does not want Apple to set up its plants in India, though the industry believes Apple could never move all its production to the US.

The Indian government has "offered us a deal where basically they are willing to literally charge us no tariff", Trump said at an event in Doha referring to the India-US trade talks.

India has already lowered tariffs on Bourbon whiskey, motorcycles and a few wines. According to the trade, India has conceded to only 90 per cent of the US goods under zero per cent tariff.

“India could offer to make 90 per cent of US exports tariff-free from day one, using a "zero-for-zero" approach—cutting tariffs on all goods except autos and agriculture,” said GTRI.

“In the case of cars, India will concede to buying vehicles under a certain CIF (Cost, insurance and freight) value threshold. The duties of these cars will be brought down significantly. India may not open up the automobile sector fully for American cars,” said Ajay Sahai, director general, FIEO.

India may also not be buying the US dairy products as there are issues related to non-vegetarian feed given to American cows, he said.

The list of products that would be increasingly bought from the US includes petroleum from shale gas, petrochemicals, polymer, defence equipment, aircrafts and high-tech chips.

Trump also said that he has asked Apple CEO Tim Cook not to build production units in India.

“I said, ‘Tim, we are treating you really good, we put up with all the plants you built in China for years. We are not interested in you building in India. India can take care of themselves'”, he said.

Amidst the tariff war with China, Apple had recently announced that it would source the majority of its US iPhone supply from India by the end of next year. However, with China getting into talks with the US, it needs to be seen how much of the production will be moved into India.

“It is too early to predict whether Apple will move a large part of the China production to India. Trump has been making statements and retracting them. While Apple may move some production to the US, it cannot afford to do it fully as the supply chain is global and quite complex. We will have to wait to see what Apple decides,” said Ashok Chandak, president of India Electronics and Semiconductor Association.

Apple assembled $22 billion worth of iPhones in India in FY25, increasing production by 60 per cent over the previous year. Foxconn Technology Group’s factory in southern India is the major supplier of India-made iphones. Tata Group’s electronics manufacturing arm, which bought Wistron Corp.’s local business and runs Pegatron Corp.’s operations in India, is also a key supplier. Tata and Foxconn are building new plants and adding production capacity.