Deal stalled as Modi didn’t call: Lutnick; inaccurate, says Govt

India faces the highest US tariffs—up to 50 per cent—despite being engaged in negotiations with Washington since February last year. Despite Lutnick’s claims, officials in Delhi maintained that the trade deal is “very much alive.”

Within hours of the remarks circulating on social media, the Government rejected Lutnick’s version of events, saying “the characterisation of these discussions in the reported remarks is not accurate.”

Ministry of External Affairs’ official spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said: “We have seen the remarks. India and the US were committed to negotiating a bilateral trade agreement with the US as far back as February 13 last year. Since then, the two sides have held multiple rounds of negotiation to arrive at a balanced and mutually beneficial trade agreement.

“On several occasions, we have been close to a deal. The characterisation of these discussions in the reported remarks is not accurate. We remain interested in a mutually beneficial trade deal between two complementary economies and look forward to concluding it. Incidentally, Prime Minister and President Trump have also spoken on phone on eight occasions during 2025, covering different aspects of our wide-ranging partnership.”

Lutnick’s comments, made during an interview on the All-In podcast on January 9, disclose two key details. First, they amount to the first public acknowledgement by a US official that India and the US had reached an understanding on a trade deal, only for US negotiators to later backtrack. Second, they suggest that Washington was displeased at not receiving a “call from Modi.”

In diplomatic terms, a call from the Prime Minister at that stage would have been read in Washington as political endorsement and formal acknowledgement from India’s highest level, something the Trump administration appears to have attached particular importance to. Sources here said that unless the deal was secured, a call at the level of the PM was “not feasible.”

Referring to Trump as the “closer” of the deal, Lutnick said: “What I would do is I would negotiate the contracts and set the whole deal up. But let’s be clear, it’s his (President Trump’s) deal. Yeah, okay, he’s the closer. He does the deal. So I said, ‘You got to have (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi (call). It’s all set up. You have to have Modi call the president.’ They were uncomfortable doing it, so Modi didn’t call,” Lutnick said.

Lutnick’s remarks come a day after senior Republican leader and US Senator Lindsey Graham said President Trump had “greenlit” the Russia sanctions bill, which proposes 500 per cent tariffs on countries buying Russian oil.

“We are aware of the proposed bill. We are closely following the developments,” Jaiswal said at his weekly media briefing. “Our position on the larger question of energy sourcing is well known…In this endeavour, we are guided by the evolving dynamics of the global market and by the imperative to secure affordable energy from diverse sources to meet the energy security needs of our 1.4 billion people.”

On Trump’s recent comments claiming that “Prime Minister Modi came to see me, ‘Sir, may I see you please’,” the MEA spokesperson said the two leaders share a “friendly relationship” and “have always addressed each other with mutual respect as per diplomatic norms.” There was, however, a sense of disquiet in Delhi over Trump’s tone.

Lutnick blamed India for the deal not materialising. “India just was, you know, on the wrong side of the seesaw, and it wasn’t. It was just they couldn’t get it done when they needed to, and then they couldn’t get it done, and then they couldn’t get it done, and then they couldn’t get it done. And so what happened is all these other countries kept doing deals, and they’re just further in the back of the line… And they remember, and I remember they say, but, but you agreed? And I said, then. Not now.”

Lutnick went on to outline his version of events, describing Trump’s deal-making style as a “staircase.”

He recalled how the US-UK deal was finalised on May 8, the same day India and Pakistan were in the middle of a military confrontation under Operation Sindoor.

“If you remember, I did the first deal with the UK… President Trump does deals like a staircase. First stair gets the best deal… So he did the UK deal… Here (UK PM Keir) Starmer is on the phone with the president, they do their deal on Wednesday night, and on Thursday, we have a press conference and we announce it.”

At the time, Trump had publicly indicated that India would be next, raising expectations in both Delhi and Washington.

“So everybody asked the president, who do you think is next?… he names India a couple of times publicly… And we told India, you had three Fridays to get it done,” Lutnick said.

He added: “So that Friday left… we did Indonesia, the Philippines… Vietnam, we announced a whole bunch of deals… And then India calls back and says, Oh, okay, we were ready. I said, ready for what it was like three weeks later. I go, are you ready for the train that left the station three weeks ago?”