"India will not bow, kneel before anyone"

Piyush Goyal, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, on India's new trade playbook, high-stakes negotiations and the road ahead

- SIDDHARTH ZARABI

It is a charged moment in the world economy, and India stands right at the heart of it.

As the global trade order rewires and nations rethink their economic alliances, India's commerce and trade policy has never been more consequential. At this high-stakes moment, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal joined BT at the India@100 event to help decode the new trade order and India's strategic playbook for navigating it. Edited excerpts from an exclusive conversation with Siddharth Zarabi and Gaurav Sawant:

SZ: At a time when global investors are very keenly looking at India, how are we shaping our engagement with the world?

A: The world keeps evolving, international trade keeps finding new pathways. What we are seeing today is possibly just a churn that happens every few years. Every few years, new countries come up, some countries go down. This is part of the history of nations. I think this is India's time (Yeh Bharat ka samay hai). What I can see right before my eyes is how Prime Minister Narendra Modi inspired the whole nation, how he raised the nation's morale, how he called upon the nation—this country will not bow; it will not kneel before anyone. Now, whether it's our farmers, our livestock breeders, our retail traders, our small industries, entrepreneurs linked to micro or small units—the government takes care of their interests; we handle the nation's affairs with public interest and national interest as the priority. India will have a place in this new world order.

GS: PM Modi often says he turns every stone thrown at him into a stepping stone. What are the stones being thrown at India right now and where do you see the opportunity in adversity?