India has completed free trade agreements with 40 nations, signalling its expanding economic clout under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who touted recent growth in manufacturing, technology, and self-reliance initiatives on Independence Day.
India said on Saturday that it has completed free trade agreements with 40 countries, using Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Independence Day address to argue that the country is gaining greater weight in the global economy. Speaking from the Red Fort, Modi said the world was beginning to recognise India’s capabilities and pointed to the trade pacts as evidence of that shift.
The prime minister tied the announcement to a broader claim that India has moved faster over the past 12 years, with gains visible in manufacturing, technology and exports. He cited sharp growth in defence production, electronics, mobile phones and modern railway coaches, arguing that stronger domestic industry is helping to raise India’s profile in international trade.
According to LiveMint, Modi said India’s manufacturing and services sectors gave the government more leverage in negotiating trade agreements, while support for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises helped widen the country’s industrial base. That fits with the government’s long-running Make in India push and production-linked incentive schemes, which industry data says have been designed to lift manufacturing’s share of GDP over time.
Modi also used the speech to press the case for self-reliance in strategic sectors. He said three semiconductor plants were already operating and that more projects were likely to come onstream over the next several years, as India tries to reduce dependence on imports in areas ranging from chips to energy. He said the country had also kept fuel and fertiliser supplies stable during the West Asia crisis, and repeated that India must think bigger if it wants to turn economic scale into lasting global influence.
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