New Delhi, Aug 1 (PTI) Karnataka IT Minister Priyank Kharge on Friday expressed concern over the US decision to impose a 25 per cent tariff on Indian exports, warning that it could undermine the country's competitiveness against emerging rivals like Vietnam.

He urged the Centre to take swift and decisive action to protect the country's electronics manufacturing ecosystem.

The remark comes at a time when Karnataka - already a thriving hub for innovation and technology - is seeking to expand its footprint in high-end electronics manufacturing with players like Apple suppliers Foxconn and Tata Electronics.

"This requires a lot more deep dive because it has been 24 hours since the US has announced these trade tariffs. But I think this is something that the Government of India seriously needs to look at," Kharge told PTI in an interview.

He highlighted the competitive challenges India faces against competing nations like Vietnam, now with these tariffs.

"If you look at the people whom we are competing at the global scale as a country, it is with Vietnam and China, Indonesia, and we are the highest in Asia...Vietnam is at 20 per cent," he said.

Kharge emphasised the limitations of state governments in addressing global trade issues and called upon the Centre to assess and strengthen its policy response to safeguard India's interests.

"So quite naturally, it will have some sort of bearing. And this is something that the state governments cannot do alone. And we are willing to support the central government in whatever way we can. But the point remains...a massive miscalculation of policies by the central government..," he said.

Stating that "so-called proximity" with US had not yielded any results for India, Kharge said: "in fact, it has become quite devastating for smaller manufacturers as well. So this is something that I think the central government needs to pull up, get their act together on".

Kharge said it's only natural for countries to protect their own ecosystems, and as the US pushes its 'Make America Great Again' agenda, India too must safeguard its own interests.

"Look, quite naturally, see, everybody will protect their ecosystem. While the President of the United States will try the MAGA slogan of 'Make America Great Again', we need to protect ecosystems as well," he said.

Geographical boundaries have become almost non-existent, due to factors like technology, cost of labour, cost of production, innovation, and cost of servicing the entire supply chain is very important, he noted.

"And the strides that we have made in Karnataka or for India, we stand to lose if we don't solve this problem, early on. And I think, like I said, again, at the cost of sounding repetitive, central government should get its act together on this. Yes, it's going to have some sort of effect on the bigger manufacturers... the supply chain is very important," he said.

He said it is still too early to assess the response of the entire ecosystem.

"So we'll have to wait-and-watch and see before I can comment anything on the entire ecosystem... It's just not about Apple or about Foxconn. It's just not about their OEMs. We are manufacturing on scale for various components across sectors, whether it is smartphones, semiconductors or space tech. And I think we should see this ecosystem as a whole and not for one particular company," Kharge said.

Asked if the state government is in touch with electronics manufacturing companies and technology players to assess their next course of action, he said: "We have spoken to a few people. And of course, they're also a little uncertain, rather, and they don't want to have any knee-jerk reactions for whatever the American government has to say." "So I think everybody is just waiting and watching what central government will do..," he said.

The US has announced a 25 per cent tariff on India as the White House released a list of duties that Washington will levy on exports from nations across the globe.

In an Executive Order titled 'Further Modifying The Reciprocal Tariff Rates' President Donald Trump announced tariff rates for nearly 70 nations around the world. PTI MBI ANZ HVA