India to Bear 26 percent Duties as Trump Declares 'Discounted' Reciprocal Tariffs

US President Donald Trump made international reciprocal tariffs, also called discounted reciprocal tariffs, in an address at the White House. Trump displayed a chart showing the United States to pay a 34 percent tax to China, 20 percent tax to the European Union, 25 percent to South Korea, 26 percent to India, 24 percent to Japan, and 32 percent to Taiwan.

In accordance with the chart, India levies a 52 percent tariff on US products for "currency manipulation and trade barriers.'Consequently, the US will henceforth impose 'discounted reciprocal tariffs' of 26 percent on imports from India.

"India is very, very difficult. The Prime Minister just departed. He's a tremendous friend of mine, but I said to him, 'You're a friend, but you're not being fair to us.' They charge us 52 percent. You have to realize, we charge them virtually nothing for years and decades. It was only seven years ago, when I became president, that we began with China and took hundreds of billions of dollars in tariffs from them", says Trump.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had traveled to Washington, D.C., in February, just after Trump started his second term as President.

Earlier, Trump has called India the 'tariff king' and a 'big abuser'.  At a joint press conference with Modi on February 13, Trump said that India has "been very strong on tariffs", adding, "I don't blame them, necessarily, but it's a different way of doing business". It's extremely difficult to sell into India because of their high trade barriers and tariffs", He added that the US trade deficit with India is almost $100 billion and that he and Modi agreed to start negotiations to resolve the long-standing imbalances in the US-India trading relationship, hoping to sign an agreement that provides a level playing field.

In announcing the tariffs, Trump stressed that America is being 'very kind' to these nations, charging them roughly half of the tariffs they charge on US products.

For those countries that are treating us badly, we will compute the overall rate of all their tariffs, non-monetary barriers, and other types of unfair practice. Since we are being very generous very nice people we will charge them roughly half of what they have been charging us. So, the tariffs will not be completely reciprocal. I could have done that, but it would have been difficult for a lot of countries that did not want to follow.

“It’s going to be Liberation Day in America, and hopefully, in the years to come, you’ll look back and say, ‘He was right. This has turned out to be one of the most significant days in our country’s history”, Trump concluded.

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