India-EU Seal Long-Awaited FTA and Security Pact Ahead of 27 Jan Summit

Trade deals often crystallise at moments of geopolitical stress: NAFTA’s 1994 signing followed the 1980s U.S.–Japan frictions; the 1957 Treaty of Rome answered the Suez shock. Likewise, the India-EU FTA is gestating amid tariff salvos from Washington and supply-chain angst over Beijing—echoes of the 1973 oil embargo that forced economies to diversify energy sources. The event reflects two long-term currents: India’s slow shedding of the protectionism it adopted after 1947 and Europe’s post-Brexit search for partners outside the Atlantic sphere. By knitting together a quarter of world output, the pact could accelerate a 21st-century trade lattice built on ‘friend-shoring’ rather than U.S.-centric multilateralism. Or it could stumble on enforcement of carbon taxes and IP rules, just as the 1963 “Kennedy Round” faltered when politics trumped tariffs. On a 100-year horizon, success would mark a pivot in which the global South helps write trade rules, signalling that economic gravity is rotating toward a multipolar order; failure would merely reaffirm that mega-FTAs remain hostage to domestic politics and climate policy fault-lines.