In the wake of Trump: The EU’s chance to redefine its India relationship

As European commission president Ursula von der Leyen arrives in New Delhi later this week with a delegation of commissioners, both Europe and India find themselves at a moment of strategic recalibration. Donald Trump’s return to power in Washington has created a crisis in transatlantic relations, forcing Brussels to seek new geopolitical partnerships. Although India’s ties with the US are in better shape, it too seeks renewed relationships elsewhere to hedge against a newly capricious America. It is hard to imagine a better time to re-energise Europe’s and India’s historically lacklustre ties. 

The decision to bring nearly all the European commissioners to Delhi to meet with their Indian counterparts sends a clear signal on the European Union’s desire to strengthen and expand ties with India in a moment of global uncertainty. For the EU, India’s size and economic growth has long made it an attractive partner. But until now attempts to strengthen ties have been hampered by bureaucratic inertia on both sides as well as a lack of clear strategic rationale.

As it seeks to mitigate the damage caused by Trump’s new administration, however, Brussels now urgently needs to build alternative geopolitical relationships. Von der Leyen made unusually conciliatory noises about China at Davos in January, for instance, noting that Europe should “strive for mutual benefits” in its conversation with Beijing. Yet at base China remains a significant strategic challenge for Europe. Building stronger ties with India—a democracy with increasing global influence—offers both greater economic opportunity and political appeal.

India’s leadership must now also grapple with a complex, unpredictable new era in US policy in which it cannot be entirely certain that ties between Washington and New Delhi will continue as they were

India also sees advantages in closer European ties. Prime minister Narendra Modi enjoyed a positive visit to Washington in January, displaying strong rapport with Trump. But India’s leadership must now also grapple with a complex, unpredictable new era in US policy in which it cannot be entirely certain that ties between Washington and New Delhi will continue as they were. As India’s external affairs minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar described it last October, India is pursuing a “multi-alignment or multi-vector” approach to foreign policy, developing ties with multiple partners to increase its geopolitical space. Given events in Washington, strengthening ties with Europe can offer a diplomatic counterbalance for New Delhi.

The most immediate focus will be technology cooperation. A meeting of the EU-India Trade and Technology Council—only the second since its foundation in 2023—offers opportunities to deepen collaboration in areas ranging from artificial intelligence to clean technologies. Specific areas of focus include electric vehicle charging infrastructure, batteries, and artificial intelligence, alongside India’s priority of “digital public infrastructure”. Making progress on trade will be more complex, despite negotiations on a free trade deal re-starting after a lengthy hiatus, although not impossible. 

But a potential new joint Europe-India agenda can be far broader. Both sides share concerns about economic security and reducing vulnerability to geoeconomic threats, from managing increased US tariffs to addressing China’s trade practices. In particular, Europe’s focus on de-risking supply chains from Chinese products, as outlined in the recent Draghi report, aligns with Indian interests in attracting greater industrial investment—if European companies can be persuaded to shift their investment focus from China to India.  

New areas of cooperation are also possible in space policy and defence. Potential Indian participation in PESCO, the EU’s framework for defence cooperation, is one potential area for discussion, given select external states can be invited to join together with EU members as backers of particular PESCO projects. A new Europe-India security and defence partnership could also be possible, adding to those recently developed with Japan and South Korea.

Challenges remain, of course. The EU has struggled over recent years to calibrate its diplomatic approach on Ukraine with New Delhi, given India’s deep historic relationship with Russia. This risks deepening as US-Russia negotiations over a potential Ukraine peace deal continue, an approach Europe is opposing but New Delhi is likely to support. By contrast, India will view any potential European warming of ties towards China with suspicion. New Delhi is also critical of EU labour and environmental measures, most obviously its carbon border adjustment mechanism—although on this point von der Leyen’s promised “omnibus” legislation to cut red tape could offer some progress.

Even so, this week’s meetings now come with a clear diplomatic commitment from both sides to develop a stronger joint agenda. Von der Leyen has promised a new joint communication on “a new Strategic EU-India Agenda” by mid-year, updating a previous document from 2018. This will be followed by a jointly authored roadmap, which will be presented at a delayed Europe-India summit, now slated for the final quarter of this year.

As new EU high representative Kaja Kallas noted in her recent confirmation hearings, the relationship has “so much unexplored potential”. Early moves by the Trump administration provide a clear external push for that dormant potential to be realised. Speaking in New Delhi last year, Jaishankar acknowledged that Europe had of late undergone a “greater strategic awakening,” even if it is one driven largely by external events. The coming months will test whether Europeans can translate this awakening into concrete progress with one of their most important potential partners.