Trump Threat to Indian IT ‘Overblown’: Harsh Gupta Madhusudan

Spread love

Expert rejects claims of US “escalation dominance,” asserts India’s IT sector and Apple manufacturing are resilient and irreplaceable

By S JHA

MUMBAI, August 2, 2025 — Economist and public intellectual Harsh Gupta Madhusudan has pushed back strongly against assertions that US President Donald Trump could severely damage India’s IT services sector or disrupt Apple’s manufacturing operations in India.

The remarks come in response to a widely shared opinion by columnist Sadanand Dhume, who argued that in a hypothetical standoff between the US and India under a second Trump presidency, Washington could “pull the plug on a large chunk of India’s IT industry” and make it “impossible for Apple to make iPhones in India.”

But Gupta called this assessment misleading and rooted in outdated power dynamics. “Trump could pull the plug on a large chunk of India’s IT industry and make it impossible for Apple to make iPhones in India if he so chooses,” Dhume had said — to which Gupta replied, “There is no alternative to India’s engineering and business talent at this cost, scale, and language ability.” Trump announced 25% tariffs on India.

He argued that India’s Information Technology Enabled Services (ITeS), Global Capability Centers (GCCs), and Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO) industries are part of a “quasi-monopsony,” where global companies rely overwhelmingly on India’s skilled talent pool. Competing locations like Krakow or Manila, he said, simply do not offer comparable scale or depth.

Gupta also refuted the notion that Apple’s manufacturing presence in India is a geopolitical favour from the US, noting that Apple is diversifying production to serve both the export and growing domestic Indian markets. “Apple knows very well how key China has been for the last 15-20 years. They know how key India will be,” he said.

He emphasized that India is not a US security-dependent state like Japan, South Korea, or Germany, and hence the leverage the US holds is limited. “We are not dependent on the US for security guarantees. On the other hand, India’s carte blanche to US Big Tech can be questioned,” he argued.

In conclusion, Gupta noted that while India remains open to engagement, it is also steadily indigenizing in defence and diversifying its strategic dependencies — a move that ensures greater resilience in the face of external political pressures. “To use a Trumpianism, you do not have as many ‘cards’ as you think you do,” he said, turning Dhume’s narrative on its head.

The exchange reflects growing debates within India’s strategic and economic circles about how to position the country amid shifting global power equations as second Trump presidency reconfigures US foreign and economic policy.