Context

• In a landmark geopolitical development, United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s new agreement with the European Union (EU) marks a strategic ‘reset’ in post-Brexit relations.
• This renewal, covering areas from food standards and fishing rights to defence and border policies, signals a shift with ramifications well beyond Europe.
• For India, a key trade, diplomatic, and demographic partner of both the U.K. and the EU, the reset presents not just challenges but significant opportunities across trade, foreign policy, and migration.

India’s Export Landscape: A Shifting Terrain

• The U.K. and the EU are major pillars of India’s external trade. In FY2024, India’s exports to the EU reached $86 billion, while exports to the U.K. stood at $12 billion.
• Post-Brexit, Indian exporters struggled to adjust to two divergent regulatory systems, complicating compliance and increasing operational costs, especially in pharmaceuticals, textiles, agro-products, and seafood.
• The prospect of a harmonised U.K.-EU regulatory regime promises to simplify this landscape, offering Indian businesses an integrated market with fewer redundancies.
• Particularly in pharmaceuticals, where India supplies over 25% of the U.K.’s generic medicine requirements, a unified approval process could streamline drug clearances and lower delivery timelines.
• Similarly, seafood exports worth over ₹60,000 crore ($7.38 billion) could benefit from aligned food safety norms.
• However, the imposition of tighter, common standards could also disadvantage India’s Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), which may lack the technological capacity to comply.
• Thus, schemes like RoDTEP and PLI must be strengthened to enhance Indian exporters’ global competitiveness.

Strategic Diplomacy and Defence Cooperation

• Bridging the Indo-Pacific with the Atlantic
  • At the heart of India’s strategic diplomacy lies the Indo-Pacific, a region central to its security, economic, and geopolitical calculations.
  • Both the EU and the U.K. have shown growing interest in this theatre, particularly as concerns over China’s assertive maritime posture intensify.
  • The EU’s ‘Strategy for Cooperation in the Indo-Pacific’ and the U.K.’s ‘Integrated Review’ explicitly call for deeper engagement with regional partners like India.
  • If the U.K. and EU begin coordinating security policies, particularly through joint naval exercises, intelligence sharing, and maritime capacity-building, India could emerge as a key security partner.
  • This would elevate India’s strategic utility as a ‘net security provider’ in the Indian Ocean and facilitate structured trilateral dialogues, possibly with groupings like the India-France-U.K. trilateral or the EU-India-U.S. Track-1.5 dialogues.
• Deepening Defence Technology Partnerships
  • Defence cooperation is already a cornerstone of India’s bilateral ties with both the U.K. and major EU nations.
  • For example, India’s partnership with France includes joint development of aircraft engines, submarines, and space-based surveillance platforms.
  • With the U.K., collaborations under the ‘2030 Roadmap’ cover co-development of jet engines and stealth technologies.
  • Germany and India have moved beyond conventional defence trade to explore advanced industrial cooperation, including cyber defence, artificial intelligence, and autonomous systems.
• Leveraging Multilateral Institutions and Norm-Setting
  • On the diplomatic front, a realigned U.K.-EU policy framework enhances India’s ability to influence global rule-making.
  • Currently, India is a member or partner in several critical forums: the G-20, BRICS, the Quad, and the United Nations.
  • However, the lack of consensus within the West often dilutes collective support for reforms India champions, such as a permanent seat on the UN Security Council or fairer rules in the World Trade Organization (WTO).
  • A coordinated European voice could lend more consistent backing to India’s proposals in multilateral settings.
  • During its G-20 presidency in 2023, India showcased its ability to represent the Global South on issues like climate finance, debt sustainability, and digital public infrastructure.
  • A unified Western bloc that sees India as a strategic partner, rather than a transactional player, could amplify India’s voice on global governance reforms.

Talent Mobility and Soft Power Dynamics

• India’s diaspora, the world’s largest, plays a crucial role in its soft power
• In 2024, the U.K. issued over 1,10,000 student visas to Indian nationals, placing India at the forefront of educational migration.
• Post-Brexit restrictions limited Indian professionals’ access to EU labour markets, but renewed U.K.-EU coordination on border controls may re-enable a semi-integrated mobility corridor.
• Such coordination could rejuvenate stalled migration pathways, enabling smoother professional transitions between the U.K. and EU countries.
• It also creates the potential to consolidate India’s existing migration agreements with Germany, France, and Portugal under a broader framework.
• As Europe ages and seeks skilled workers, India, with its vast young workforce, is well-positioned to supply talent, provided the bilateral and multilateral agreements are skill-oriented and forward-looking.

Conclusion

• The evolving U.K.-EU partnership is not merely a regional diplomatic adjustment; it is a geopolitical pivot with global consequences.
• For India, it is an opportunity to reshape its trade architecture, assert strategic leadership in multilateral fora, and expand its influence through a reinvigorated diaspora and mobility regime.
• To capitalise on this moment, India must urgently modernise its export infrastructure, invest in regulatory capacity building, and deepen strategic partnerships with both the U.K. and EU nations.