India’s trade diplomacy has often been a patient sport; this time it is also audacious. On October 1st, the Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement with the four countries of the European Free Trade Association—Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein—took effect, and with it a striking new template for how New Delhi wants globalisation to work.
The pact is India’s first with a group of developed European economies and the first to braid market access with binding promises of investment and employment: ₹8,87,100 crore (US$100bn) in committed capital and one million direct jobs over 15 years. For India, a continental-scale economy midway through a manufacturing push, that combination matters more than tidy tariff tables. It signals a shift from export-led hope to capacity-building intent—an insistence that trade openness be matched by hard assets, technology and skills on Indian soil. The market-access arithmetic is nonetheless impressive.
- “₹8,87,100 crore and one million jobs: India’s first FTA with binding investment and employment targets.”
- “92.2% of EFTA tariff lines cut, covering 99.6% of India’s exports; India opens 82.7% covering 95.3% of theirs.”
- “Services with teeth: mutual recognition in nursing, accountancy and architecture to unlock high-skill mobility.”
- “From tariff cuts to toolrooms: why TEPA is designed to bring factories, labs and apprenticeships to India.”
- “Sensitive sectors shielded—reform where growth demands, prudence where politics requires.”
EFTA has lowered tariffs across 92.2% of its lines, covering 99.6% of the goods India sells to those markets; India, for its part, has opened 82.7% of its lines, covering 95.3% of EFTA exports.
The result is liberal where growth demands it and prudent where politics requires it: sensitive sectors such as dairy, soya, coal, pharmaceuticals and much of agriculture sit behind exclusions or tapered cuts, respecting rural livelihoods and strategic autonomy without freezing reform.
What distinguishes this deal, however, is not a one-off surge in shipments but the architecture for compounding gains. On goods, zero-duty or sharply reduced-duty windows will sharpen India’s competitiveness in processed foods, marine products and precision engineering, where factories can scale quickly and suppliers can be plugged into European value chains that prize reliability. On services, the agreement tidies up access across delivery modes and—crucially—leans into professional mobility, with mutual-recognition pathways in regulated fields such as nursing, accountancy and architecture. That is nitty-gritty work with outsize payoff: qualifications recognised abroad turn individual careers into institutional linkages, pave the way for joint curricula and apprenticeships, and anchor capabilities that stay long after a project ends. If Make in India is to be more than a slogan, this is how: match tariff preferences with standards, skills and steady investment.
The investment pledge itself is designed as patient capital, not a hot-money sugar rush. By tying the deal to long-horizon FDI—factories, labs, toolrooms and training centres—it invites EFTA’s strengths to meet India’s scale. Swiss precision manufacturing and life-sciences know-how, Norwegian energy systems and maritime services, Icelandic expertise in resource-efficient processes and clean technologies, Liechtenstein’s prowess in industrial components and finance—these are complementary, not competitive, with India’s ambition to build deeper supply chains in electronics, machinery and engineered goods. Add in stronger intellectual-property rules and technology-cooperation language, and TEPA looks less like a tariff bargain and more like an industrial-policy flywheel. The optimism is not naïve. Integrating stringent European standards will test Indian firms; so will climbing compliance curves in sustainability, traceability and data. Some exporters will discover that preference margins are quickly competed away. And translating a headline promise of $100bn into real projects requires steady regulatory clarity, faster land and power connections, and credible contract enforcement. Yet the politics of the deal are shrewd.
By insulating the most sensitive farm and small-industry constituencies, the agreement preserves domestic consensus while creating beachheads in sectors that can hire at scale. By coupling market opening to verifiable investment and job numbers, it answers the old critique that free-trade agreements flatter the current account but starve domestic capacity. And by putting services and skill mobility alongside goods, it harnesses India’s strongest comparative advantage—talent—in support of its most urgent aspiration—modern manufacturing.
The near-term wins could be tangible. Machinery and engineering goods should ride tariff cuts and co-production deals into richer niches; chemicals, textiles and gems and jewellery will benefit from predictability and high-quality logistics channels; electronics makers will find it easier to source precision components and export value-added assemblies; processed food and marine exporters will secure price-points that stick in demanding supermarkets. Behind the border, investment tied to training and MRAs will lift vocational standards, growing a cohort of nurses, accountants, architects and technicians whose credentials travel—and whose practices raise the bar at home.
Over time the compounding effects are more exciting: factories that calibrate to European norms exporting to the world; Indian midsized suppliers winning contracts because they are now “EFTA-ready”; clusters that blend design from Zurich, power systems from Oslo and process discipline from Reykjavik with Indian ingenuity and cost advantage.
TEPA will not rewire the economy overnight. But it tilts the playing field towards productivity: towards better machines, stricter standards, richer skills and steadier investment. In a fracturing world where trade often masquerades as security policy, this is refreshingly practical statecraft—optimistic, yes, but grounded. It casts India not as a supplicant for access but as a confident platform: open to commerce, exacting on quality, and determined that globalisation should translate into better jobs at home. If India executes—if it speeds clearances, protects property, and invests in ports, grids and people—the quartet it has just partnered can punch well above its weight. And the lesson for larger negotiating partners will be hard to miss: blend market access with patient capital and professional mobility, and India will meet you halfway—with scale, stability and staying power.
- “A compact club of rich Europeans bets long on Indian manufacturing and talent.”
- “EFTA’s zero-duty concessions sharpen India’s edge in processed foods, marine goods and precision engineering.”
- “IP protection and technology collaboration align TEPA with Make in India and Atmanirbhar Bharat.”
- “A template for future FTAs: pair market access with verifiable investment and skills.”