India-US trade deal may be sealed in weeks, not months: Marco Rubio

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the India-US trade deal could be finalised within weeks and reaffirmed President Donald Trump's support for India

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday sought to allay concerns about the perceived rise in anti-India rhetoric in his country and said US President Donald Trump loved India and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He also expressed hope that the India-US trade deal could be finalised within weeks.

 

Rubio reiterated Washington’s keenness to host Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who could travel to Florida to attend the G20 Summit in December, for a “standalone” bilateral summit with US President Donald Trump. Rubio, who met the PM on Saturday, said Modi “indicated” that he would travel to the US.

 

However, with the G20 Summit still over six months away, the Indian side is yet to firm up the PM’s itinerary. New Delhi expects the US side to appreciate that it is India’s turn to host Trump, including for the Quad Summit, which India was scheduled to host in 2025, but it was postponed.

 

 

Rubio told reporters on Monday morning that the US President “is a big fan of India, a big fan of Prime Minister Modi”. “I wouldn’t be here if the President didn’t want me to be here. He wouldn’t have sent someone like Sergio (Gor) to be our ambassador, someone who’s very close to the President,” Rubio said.

 

At an event celebrating the 250th anniversary of American independence at Bharat Mandapam on Sunday evening, Trump came on the line with US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor and said, “India can count on me 100 per cent”, and described PM Modi as a “great” friend. “I just want to say hello to everybody. I love the Prime Minister, (Narendra) Modi is great, he is my friend and I just want to say a very good evening to everybody,” Trump said in a phone conversation with Gor. “I am a big, big fan of Prime Minister Modi,” he said. In his remarks at the event, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said that the Indian diaspora in the US has helped build political understanding between the two countries.

 

However, on Monday morning, a journalist travelling with Rubio again asked him about an Indian journalist’s question on Sunday afternoon regarding the alleged increase in anti-Indian racist remarks. The journalist pointed out that the Indian journalist was alluding to Trump’s controversial remarks against Indians.

 

In April, Trump shared a right-wing television anchor Michael Savage’s social media post, which described India and China as “hellholes” and criticised US immigration laws. India’s Ministry of External Affairs had then termed the views “uninformed, inappropriate and in poor taste”.

 

On Sunday, the US State Department posted Rubio’s remarks in response to the racism question along with other comments on X, but deleted the post hours later. Rubio said on Monday that he had specifically asked the reporter during the joint media briefing whom he was referring to, but the reporter did not respond. “The bottom line is that in the modern era, you go online, and there are people saying all kinds of crazy stuff. I don’t even know if they’re real people or who they are,” Rubio said, indicating that he thought the reporter was referring to comments by people online.

 

On Sunday, at his joint press briefing with Jaishankar, Rubio had replied that there are people who make comments online and elsewhere because every country in the world has stupid people, including in the US and India, who make dumb comments all the time. “Our nation has been enriched by people who come to our country from all over the world, have become Americans, have assimilated into our way of life, and have contributed greatly,” he said.

 

Along with US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor’s efforts in the past few months, Rubio’s visit to India — his first to the country — has been an attempt to rebuild frayed India-US ties.

 

In an interview with a private television network, Rubio said the US’ strategic alliance with India is among the “handful of really important strategic alliances”. Rubio said Washington hopes to host PM Modi for a separate standalone visit, “a meeting in addition to G20”, and that Modi indicated he would come. He said the details would be worked out. “He (Modi) was there last year. We’d love to see him come back,” Rubio said.

 

On the India-US trade deal, Rubio said he was confident it would be signed “maybe next week or the week after”, and that the two sides were “down to very final details”. Rubio said while tariffs receive much attention, it is access to products that matters, and every trade agreement “requires modernisation every 10, 20, 30 years because new sectors emerge, because new imbalances emerge”. “I wouldn’t put a definitive timeline, but I think it is weeks, not months,” Rubio said.

 

On India’s concerns about Pakistan harbouring terror networks, Rubio said the US hopes it would be able to work with Pakistani authorities to go after these very dangerous groups, which pose a threat to people in the region and to US interests.

   

Rubio will attend the Quad foreign ministers’ meeting on Tuesday morning. On Monday, the penultimate day of his four-day visit to India, Rubio and his wife Jeanette Rubio visited the Taj Mahal in Agra and Amber Fort in Jaipur. 

Iran consulate takes swipe at Rubio’s Taj visit 

The Iranian Consulate in Hyderabad on Monday took a swipe at the visit of US Secretary of State Marco Rubio to the Taj Mahal, saying the monument was crafted by the genius of Iranian architects and accused the US of “threatening” to wipe out Iranian civilisation. The Consulate General of the Islamic Republic of Iran-Hyderabad said: “If Rubio knew the history or architecture, he wouldn’t have posed for a picture here. This monument was built out of love for the emperor’s Iranian wife, crafted by the genius of Iranian architects - meanwhile, his government today threatens to wipe out Iranian civilisation, insulting other civilisations.” (PTI)