India’s trade deficit widened sharply to $26.42 billion in April, up from $21.54 billion in March, amid global trade and supply chains being upended by United States’ President Donald Trump’s tariff hikes on its trading partners.
For the previous month, India’s trade deficit expanded to $21.54 billion in March, up from a three-year low of $14.05 billion in February.
Imports were up 19.12% to $64.91 billion in April as against $54.49 billion in same month last year, according to government data. While exports for the month of April were up 9.03% y-o-y to $38.49 billion.
“I hope India will maintain this export momentum,” said Commerce Secretary Sunil Barthwal.
Economists had expected the April trade deficit to be $20 billion, according to a Reuters poll.
India’s services trade exports increased to $35.31 billion as against $30.18 billion in same month last year. On the other hand, the services trade imports reached $17.54 billion, up from $16.76 billion in April 2024. The surplus for April services trade was at $17.77 billion.
The non-oil imports in April stood at $44.20 billion as against $37.99 billion in same month last year. India’s engineering goods exports touched $9.51 billion in April 2025 as against $8.55 billion in April 2024.
India’s electronic goods exports increased to $3.69 billion in April 2025 when compared to $2.65 billion in April 2024.
Additionally, gold imports touched $3.10 billion in April, up from $2.95 billion in same month last year.
India-US trade ties:
In April, the US announced a 26% tariff on Indian goods, lower than those imposed on competing nations like China, Vietnam and Bangladesh.
India’s exports to the U.S. rose to $8.42 billion in April from $6.61 billion a year earlier.
The levies, which the White House called reciprocal tariffs, targeting India and many other nations were later put on hold for 90 days until July 8, while an agreement to pause tariffs imposed on China was reached last weekend.
US President Donald Trump on Thursday revealed that India has offered a trade deal to the United States which would see “basically zero tariffs” on a broad range of American goods. Washington and New Delhi have been engaged in a flurry of ongoing high-level trade negotiations to resolve tariff and market access issues.
According to a report by Reuters on May 9, India had proposed to reduce its average tariff differential with the US from around 13% to under 4%—a 9-percentage-point drops. This would be among the most comprehensive moves by India to align its trade policies with major global partners.
Under the proposed deal, India has offered to bring duties down to zero on 60% of tariff lines in the first phase.
