ETSA champions show the great Indian dream is all home-brewed and visa-free: Union Minister Piyush Goyal

Commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal was the guest of honour at the ETSA event, days after returning from the US where he attended the G20 Trade Ministers’ Meeting and held discussions on a trade agreement with the Trump administration. In a candid conversation with ET’s Deepshikha Sikarwar, he spoke about India’s trade deals, India-US relations, foreign investment, and how Indian businesses will benefit from the restrictions on the green card programme. Edited excerpts:

Where is the India-US relationship headed, with various statements that have come in the past two days?

Two countries where the leaders, governments, businesses and the people are quite intrinsically engaged with each other will always have certain friction points. But at the same time, there is recognition in both countries that this is a relationship which is very consequential. It is a relationship that both countries would like to nurture for the future. I would not read too much into every single incident or every single comment. My own submission to you would be to look at the longer-term impact that this relationship will have on the global economy, and you’ll realise that we are friends, and we will continue to be very good friends.


The IT and tech sectors have concerns over the decisions on H-1B visas and the green card programme…

Not at all. In fact, I heard Tata (Consultancy Services) say that they will not be hit at all by this. I personally have never ever raised the issue of H-1B visas or green cards in my conversations with the US, particularly in the last seven and a half years as commerce minister. Immigration is not an FTA issue, nor is it directly related to trade. What relates to trade is mobility, and mobility to provide a service is very essential.

Every country has the right to monitor and regulate. We would not like people from across the world to have open access to our country. I personally believe that not getting more H-1B visas is absolutely good for the Indian economy. Some of our best talent over the last, particularly 25-30 years has gone away to the US, and I see the billionaires of Indian origin literally down every street. I wonder what would have happened if all of them had been doing their businesses in India.

After the Covid pandemic, things have changed dramatically. You don’t need to be physically present to do a lot of the things. It is only a few people who may need to go and certainly there should not be a problem for those people. The larger bulk of the work is now coming to Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune, Gurugram, Noida, Mumbai. Businesses are understanding the value of having their global capability centres in India. Not getting H-1B visas is going to create probably a greater thrust to the startup ecosystem. We’ve only just begun.

In the deep tech space, we can still count the startups of significance in a few thousands. We have a long way to go. Every one of these spaces — defence, or research institutions — the educational institutions of eminence across the world, has significant Indian presence at the leadership and operating levels. You can get better, if not the best, in that profession in India, at maybe one-fifth or one-sixth that value. He will be paying taxes in India, sitting in infrastructure created in India and living with his family, which is not necessarily a luxury all these H-1B persons get when they go to the US. He will be spending in India and consuming the goods and services that all our entrepreneurs, businesses, and startups will provide. So, look at the entire ecosystem, and you will realise every H-1B visa not granted is a big win for India.

Are some US companies looking at scaling up operations here?

Not some, all of them, because this is where the talent is.

Where are we on the bilateral trade deal? US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said the deal is not imminent, and the government here has said talks have plateaued.

We are talking to each other because circumstances have significantly changed from the first week of February when we shook hands and announced the deal. The (US) Supreme Court took away the powers of the President to have the IEEPA (International Emergency Economic Powers Act) tariffs. Since then, they have been working on different models to bring in tariffs and to give competitive advantage to those who do deals with them.

A free trade agreement is basically giving your trading partner access to your market at a preferential rate or in a preferential manner compared to the competition. So, I don’t have to necessarily always make everything at zero duty.

The Modi government has only focused on developed, rich and prosperous countries. With our nine FTAs, we cover 38 developed countries, all of them having per capita income significantly more than India, economies significantly more prosperous than India, where we don’t directly compete. We actually complement each other. Products that we want to sell, they just cannot make at this price. The products that they want to offer, we need them in India. We need GPUs, data centre equipment and best of class defence equipment from America. India would have preferential access to $85 trillion of GDP with all its trade agreements. That’s what we are trying to unlock for all our startups, entrepreneurs and businesses. Now, obviously, there’s a lot of hard bargaining. So, when the honourable finance minister says things have plateaued, from all that she said, you picked up only the headline.

We have the UK FTA in the bag, EU almost done…

It’s totally done. The India FTA will be the fastest approval process that the EU has ever done. On January 27, we announced closure and by early next year, it will come into force. In our FTA with 27 nations on the other side (EU), not one nation is opposing an item. There’s 100% unanimity in the EU.

Our negotiations with the US are on a steady keel. When you look at the text of what the honourable FM said, she said we’ve concluded the deal. We have nothing more to give or to take. And the fine print is being worked upon. The basic element is how they will give us the comparative advantage, which we had agreed upon in February, and that requires a little bit of legal acumen, which AI cannot give, because this is going beyond the textbook, and that’s what we are working on.

Did you get some assurance from the US on the proposed punitive tariffs on Russian oil?

The world recognises the quality of oil that Indian refineries use, the sour medium quality of oil largely comes from the Middle East or from Russia. There are some refineries which can use the quality of oil that the US makes. They are buying a lot of oil from the US. A lot of our gas comes from the US. Our ideal case scenario is to have a very diversified portfolio of countries. We would like Canada to also supply our energy needs. We are a self-respecting country. We have to protect our national interests.

We’ve seen outflows in the capital markets and FDI as well. Why is FDI not being sticky?

The levels we have reached in our artificial intelligence story are still not significant enough for the stock market or listing of our AI companies.

The story that we have seen of stock market outflows largely is because of the greater attraction of technology stocks in the West or other developed countries. Now, with interest rate differential between US bonds and Indian bonds also being significantly less…it’s quite natural that we will see some slowing down of flows.

What’s next for domestic startups ?

We are willing to fund whatever it takes to take our startups to the rest of the world. Please identify every single exhibition, conference, seminar, or opportunity to showcase our startups. Bharat Innovates, which we took to Nice (France)…130 of our best startups in the deeptech space, selected out of 3,000. So, if we can take our Indian startups to the world, the government, my ministry, is ready to support.

We need to think big. Let’s get out of the cosy comfort of the large Indian opportunity or Indian market. Let’s think of going global, because those who will not, will be left behind. We have to offer this to the world, and not be dependent on their intelligence coming to India.