India’s decision to deepen its engagement with China at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit comes at a time when Donald Trump is tightening tariff screws on New Delhi, and the timing is significant: while Washington seeks to pressure India into compliance on trade and energy choices, New Delhi is signalling that it will not be cornered and will instead pursue a policy of strategic autonomy, engaging Beijing and Moscow on its own terms even as it keeps its partnership with the United States intact.
New Delhi: The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Tianjin has emerged as far more than just another multilateral meeting of Eurasian powers. It is becoming a stage on which subtle but powerful messages in global diplomacy are being sent, and one of those messages is directed squarely at Washington. The image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi seated alongside Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin may appear routine in the framework of such summits, but for the United States particularly for Donald Trump, who has sharpened his rhetoric on trade and tariffs against India this carries uncomfortable implications. In the theatre of international politics, optics matter, and these optics reveal that New Delhi is not willing to be pushed into a corner.
Trump’s approach to foreign policy has long been described as transactional, sometimes theatrical, and often contradictory. He prides himself on his instinctive style, making dramatic pronouncements on social media before even his closest advisers are briefed. While this approach has generated headlines, it has also unsettled allies. For India, which has invested two decades in building strategic convergence with Washington, Trump’s abrupt imposition of 25 percent tariffs on key exports has felt less like tough love and more like selective targeting. To make matters worse, the justification offered that India continues to buy energy from Russia rings hollow when placed against the reality that China, the European Union, and Turkey also import vast quantities of Russian oil and gas without facing similar tariff punishment. This has fostered a sense of unfair treatment in New Delhi, casting a shadow on the once-celebrated “natural partnership” between the world’s two largest democracies.
It is in this context that the SCO platform becomes meaningful. The summit is not designed to undercut the West, nor is India seeking to shift allegiance away from Washington. But participation in such forums demonstrates that India is pursuing a deliberate policy of strategic autonomy balancing ties across competing global blocs while protecting its own interests. The Modi government has been consistent in its assertion that this is not an era of war, and that dialogue must take precedence over confrontation, particularly in the context of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. At a time when Trump is painting partners into corners with punitive economic tools, India’s positioning as a voice for dialogue resonates widely across the Global South. It also challenges Washington’s assumption that it can dictate the choices of others through coercive pressure.
Trump, for his part, has not concealed his irritation with India. Labeling the country the “tariff king,” he has frequently complained about trade imbalances while ignoring the vast services, technology, and investment flows that benefit both nations. His grievance-driven messaging often overlooks the strategic rationale of the India-US partnership, reducing it instead to a scorecard of perceived wins and losses in bilateral trade. In doing so, he risks undermining the broader Indo-Pacific strategy that depends heavily on India as a stabilising anchor against Chinese assertiveness. By punishing India over issues like Russian oil, while simultaneously exploring his own avenues of engagement with Moscow, Trump has left New Delhi questioning the reliability of American commitments.
This uncertainty is precisely why the SCO summit has value for India. Even as tensions with China remain unresolved particularly along the disputed Himalayan border India’s presence in Tianjin signals that it will not foreclose dialogue, nor will it allow external powers to dictate whom it can engage with. The message to Washington is clear: India will neither be bullied into compliance nor reduced to a junior partner in global affairs. Strategic autonomy remains the guiding principle, and platforms like the SCO and BRICS serve as counterweights to overdependence on any single power bloc.
Of course, the SCO does not erase the serious differences between India and China. Trust remains low, military standoffs continue, and economic rivalry is intensifying. But as a multilateral framework, it provides a space where adversaries can coexist in dialogue, lowering the temperature of confrontation while simultaneously exploring shared concerns such as counterterrorism, energy security, and regional connectivity. For Modi, participation in this space enhances India’s profile as a balancing power able to converse with all sides without being seen as captive to any one camp. For Trump, however, the optics are bound to be unsettling. The very India he has sought to pressure with tariffs is instead asserting independence on the world stage, sitting comfortably at the table with America’s foremost strategic competitors.
The broader message from Tianjin, therefore, is not about India choosing Beijing over Washington, but about India choosing itself. As the global order becomes increasingly fragmented, India is ensuring it has multiple avenues to safeguard its interests. That is the essence of strategic autonomy, and it is a philosophy that does not sit well with Trump’s binary worldview of winners and losers. In his calculus, nations are either compliant partners or defiant opponents, leaving little space for nuanced middle paths. But India has made it clear that it will walk its own path, balancing cooperation with competition, and preserving sovereignty in its foreign policy.
Ultimately, what the SCO summit underscores is a reality that Washington must come to terms with: India will not be cajoled into alignment through threats or tariffs. It will engage the US, but it will also engage China and Russia when necessary. It will be a partner, but never a pawn. And in that assertion of independence lies the very message from Tianjin that Donald Trump will not like.