The Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (CITI) has expressed concern over the potential impact on India’s textile and apparel exports because of the likely additional tariffs planned by the US following the signing of the ‘Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026’ by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Ashwin Chandran, chairman of CITI, said in a press release that the U.S. is the single-largest market for India’s textile and apparel exports. “Any additional tariffs under this Act will be very difficult to absorb for the MSME-dominated Indian textile and apparel sector that is already under stress due to several factors, including the continuing turmoil in West Asia. It will severely impact our ability to sell in the U.S., our most significant market,” he said.

“We eagerly look forward to the Union government engaging more closely with the U.S. to ensure that Indian exporters are not disadvantaged and rendered completely uncompetitive,” he said. A fair, balanced, and equitable bilateral trade deal between India and the U.S. is the need of the hour.

Balanced and predictable trade framework could strengthen bilateral commercial engagement, and support the long-term competitiveness of the textile and apparel sectors in both countries.

Although the Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) signed by India would open new markets for Indian exporters, these FTAs could not substitute the U.S. market for the textile and apparel sector. “The FTAs offer a lot of potential, but the gains from these … will take time to materialise,” he said.

In Coimbatore, one of the main MSME clusters in the country, price of copper has shot up by almost 75% in the past one year. One kg of copper now costs ₹1,450 as against ₹800-₹900 a kg last year.

The prices had touched ₹1,500 a kg earlier in the year and softened only recently.

With MSMEs in Coimbatore manufacturing automobile components, electric vehicles, pumps, renewable energy components, electronic parts, and so on, the high price of copper is eroding the competitiveness of the engineering industries.

The U.S. and China are the major consumers of copper globally, and India imports almost all its requirements. In the recent months, use of recycled copper is on the rise because of the prices, said industry sources here.

V. Rangaswamy, president of the Coimbatore District Small Industries Association, said if the price hike was less than 10%, the units would have absorbed it fully. With over 60% increase, however, the MSMEs were able to pass on [to the customers] just 10%-15% of the rise in copper prices. Along with it, prices of steel and zinc have also gone up.

“MSMEs fix the pries once in a year or once in two years. Hence, they are unable to pass on the hike fully to the customers. Further, it is not just the price of copper. Cost of all petroleum-based products have also seen a hike. These have eroded the competitiveness of the MSMEs,” he said.

Schemes such as raw material banks were not helpful in these situations as copper was precious and could not be stored in bulk, he added. “Copper is like gold now. Even if a small quantity is lost, the MSMEs will stand to lose,” he said.

Jayakumar Ramadas of Mahendra Pumps said use of copper coated wires is becoming common in many pumpsets manufacturing units. “We tell our customers whether the wires used are copper or copper coated and have priced the pumps accordingly,” he said. According to him technology will evolve gradually around use of copper-coated products for industrial use.

In Coimbatore, one of the main MSME clusters in the country, price of copper has shot up by almost 75% in the past one year. One kg of copper now costs ₹1,450 as against ₹800-₹900 a kg last year.

The prices had touched ₹1,500 a kg earlier in the year and softened only recently.

With MSMEs in Coimbatore manufacturing automobile components, electric vehicles, pumps, renewable energy components, electronic parts, and so on, the high price of copper is eroding the competitiveness of the engineering industries.

The U.S. and China are the major consumers of copper globally, and India imports almost all its requirements. In the recent months, use of recycled copper is on the rise because of the prices, said industry sources here.

V. Rangaswamy, president of the Coimbatore District Small Industries Association, said if the price hike was less than 10%, the units would have absorbed it fully. With over 60% increase, however, the MSMEs were able to pass on [to the customers] just 10%-15% of the rise in copper prices. Along with it, prices of steel and zinc have also gone up.

“MSMEs fix the pries once in a year or once in two years. Hence, they are unable to pass on the hike fully to the customers. Further, it is not just the price of copper. Cost of all petroleum-based products have also seen a hike. These have eroded the competitiveness of the MSMEs,” he said.

Schemes such as raw material banks were not helpful in these situations as copper was precious and could not be stored in bulk, he added. “Copper is like gold now. Even if a small quantity is lost, the MSMEs will stand to lose,” he said.

Jayakumar Ramadas of Mahendra Pumps said use of copper coated wires is becoming common in many pumpsets manufacturing units. “We tell our customers whether the wires used are copper or copper coated and have priced the pumps accordingly,” he said. According to him technology will evolve gradually around use of copper-coated products for industrial use.

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Textile mills are witnessing a revival in cotton yarn demand, with capacity utilisation crossing 90%, but a sharp rise in cotton prices is raising concerns over the sustainability of operations.

“The demand for cotton yarn started reviving almost five months ago and currently, mills are not holding much yarn stocks,” said Durai Palanisamy, chairman of the Southern India Mills Association (SIMA).

Cotton prices have risen sharply since mid-March, with domestic prices increasingly moving in line with ICE Futures, he said, adding mills are also maintaining relatively low inventories, with most having less than two months of cotton stock.

Cotton prices, which remained in the range of ₹51,700 to ₹57,000 a candy between October last year and the end of March 2026, had climbed to ₹70,000 a candy on September 2 on an ex-gin basis.

“Various factors such as higher demand from China and lower production expected from the U.S. and China are pushing the prices up,” said Nishant Asher, secretary of Indian Cotton Federation.

The increase in raw material costs has also pushed up cotton yarn prices.

“Our cotton yarn cannot be consumed fully by the domestic apparel sector. Textile mills need to tap opportunities in the international market for viable operations. Yarn prices adjust to cotton prices. Internationally too, yarn availability is under pressure, pushing prices up,” said Ravi Sam, vice-chairman of the Cotton Textile Export Promotion Council.

Industry sources said Indian cotton prices remain lower than international prices. The Cotton Corporation of India (CCI), which holds a substantial quantity of cotton procured under the minimum support price (MSP) regime, should stabilise domestic cotton prices.

​Accounting firm Deloitte will pay $21.5 million to settle a ⁠U.S. Department of Justice probe over diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices, which President Donald Trump’s administration has cracked down on during his second term in ‌office.

The settlement marks a resolution reached through the DOJ’s unit formed last year called the “Civil Rights Fraud Initiative” ‌to crack down on DEI policies using a civil anti-fraud ‌law.

The ⁠Trump administration has targeted public and private organisations, from ⁠government agencies to universities, over DEI practices that civil rights advocates say help address historic inequities for marginalised groups like women, the LGBT community and ethnic minorities.

The ​White House casts DEI ‌as anti-merit and discriminatory against groups such as white people and men. Mr. Trump has signed executive orders asking Federal contractors and subcontractors to eliminate DEI. Civil rights groups say such steps are rolling ‌back social progress.

Many U.S. companies scaled back or ​modified diversity policies after Mr. Trump’s orders.

The DOJ said on Tuesday (August 25, 2026) that business units within Deloitte received monthly summaries ⁠tracking the “demographic goals” and alleged that Deloitte’s Partners, Principals and Managing Directors were evaluated, in part, based on their contributions to helping Deloitte ‌achieve its workforce composition goals.

The DOJ alleged that such DEI goals aimed at improving the representation of the Black and Hispanic communities impacted promotion decisions.

Deloitte denies ‌it engaged in discriminatory conduct

Deloitte denies it engaged in discriminatory conduct and the settlement agreement released on Tuesday (August 25, 2026) said it does not amount to an admission of liability. The company said it was ‌pleased to resolve the matter to “avoid the cost and distraction of protracted litigation”.

The ​Justice Department’s settlement also resolves claims filed by the American Alliance for Equal Rights, a group founded by affirmative ⁠action opponent Edward Blum, pursuant to the U.S. False Claims Act, ⁠which allows whistleblowers to sue companies on the government’s behalf to recover taxpayer funds paid out based on false ‌claims.

Whistleblowers are entitled to a cut of any recovery in such cases. Under the settlement agreement, Blum’s group will receive $4.3 ​million, the DOJ said.

Indian athletes returned with three individual medals at the World Athletics Under-20 Championships last week but for the medalists, it was more a case of gold lost than silver or bronze won.

Ashish Yadav, who became only the second Indian javelin thrower to win a medal with his 74.09m throw for silver, blamed lack of practice and injury for his below-par performance.

“My throwing on ground had completely stopped before the competition. I was in rehab, recovering from a knee and hamstring injury and went straight into competition and could not do as well as I had hoped,” Ashish said during a media interaction here on Wednesday.

While even matching his personal best of 79m would have still kept him in second spot, Ashish is now hoping to become the latest addition to the group of 80m plus throwers in the country.

“This was only my second international competition and the previous one, the Asian Under-20 Championships (in May) was disappointing so a medal here is satisfying,” he added. Ashish had failed to cross 70m and placed fifth then.

Basant Meghwal, who missed out on gold in high jump on countback, was equally disappointed. Meghwal finished behind Younes Ayachi of Algeria, having cleared 2.21m in his second attempt.

“I was thinking about gold only but it didn’t happen. I am happy I matched my personal best but if I had done so in my first attempt, I could have got gold. I even tried going for 2.24m but the previous attempt took a lot of effort and my ankle had started paining,” he explained.

Shahnavaz Khan, who won bronze in long jump and has already qualified for the Asian Games, rued the fact that he started cramping after his third jump, which was also his best attempt at 7.84m. “My best normally is in the last three jumps only but I was unable to push harder because of cramps. But I am confident of recovering well in time for Asian Games,” he insisted.

Indian garment exporters are hoping for tariff-rate quota, which countries such as the Bangladesh have got, from Washington as India is also a major buyer of U.S. cotton.

Officials in a couple of textile and apparel export promotion councils told The Hindu on Wednesday that the Indian government is trying to negotiate with the U.S. for tariff concession for garments that are made with U.S. cotton and are exported to that country. “Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Malaysia will not be charged the additional 10% tariff by America for garments that have U.S. cotton. However, this is a quota-based concession and will not apply for all garments exported by Bangladesh to the U.S. Australia offers India similar concessions,” said one of the officials. Further, India is talking to the U.S. for a bilateral trade agreement too.

India imports substantial quantity of American cotton and hence, the garment exporters have asked for tariff-rate quota for India too. While Indian exporters are at a disadvantage because of this concession to some of the competing countries, it may not affect India much because it is quota-based, they said.  

The threat of higher tariff on India because of its oil imports from Russia is another threat for the exporters now.

The officials said the U.S. is an important trading partner for India and its total garment imports are worth $80 billion. However, EU is also a major market, importing close to $ 120 billion worth garments. If India is able to expand deeper into the EU market, the garment exporters will have an alternative market to supply to, they added.

The Union government has set a target of $21 billion worth textile and apparel exports from Tamil Nadu by 2030, said T.N. Venkatesh, Principal Secretary, Department of Handlooms, Textiles, Khadi, and Handicrafts, Tamil Nadu, in Tiruppur on Sunday (June 28, 2026).

India is expected to achieve $100 billion export of textiles and apparel by 2030 and Tamil Nadu’s contribution will be one-fifth, and Tiruppur cluster alone would contribute nearly $11.5 billion. “This will be easy to achieve with the investments in research and development and free trade agreements,” he said.

One of the main demands of the Tiruppur garment industry was hostels for the women workers. The Tamil Nadu government has allocated ₹1,250 crore to construct “Thozhi hostels” in industrial clusters, and hostels for women workers in Tiruppur will be constructed under this scheme. A Centre of Excellence for athleisure (athletic wear) will also be set up in Tiruppur, Mr. Venkatesh said.

Union Textile Minister Giriraj Singh told the garment exporters at the meeting organised by the Tiruppur Exporters Association that annual exports of textiles and apparel hit the $44 billion mark only once since 1998. It is now at $38 billion and the target is $100 billion by 2030.

India has a free trade agreement with Japan. But, its exports to Japan are not much. Garment exporters need to diversify at least 20% of their exports to new markets, he said.

Even though Gulveer Singh clocked 13:52.92, well outside the Asian Games qualifying mark of 13:39.18, to win the men’s 5,000m at the National inter-State athletics meet at the Kalinga Stadium here on Wednesday, he may still stand a chance of being picked for the 5,000m and 10,000m races.

Since the Athletics Federation of India selection committee will take the final decision, Gulveer has a good chance to get picked on the basis of his consistent performances.

The 28-year-old Gulveer, the 10,000m bronze medallist in the last Asiad and the 5,000m and 10,000m gold medallist in the Asian championships, had issues in acclimatising after landing here from a six-month training stint in the USA.

“I used to wake up at 2 o’clock in the night. I have gotten used to it (the time zone), about 50 per cent now,” said Gulveer after finishing his first race in India this season.

“I am not satisfied with the time. It’s hot. The track is new, it’s not gripping well and is bouncy.”

Gulveer Singh of Uttar Pradesh after winning the men’s 5,000m race in the 65th National inter-State senior athletics championship at the Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on Wednesday, June 24, 2026.
| Photo Credit:
BISWARANJAN ROUT

Gulveer, the National record holder in 5,000m and 10,000m, wants to retain his focus on his training, despite the pressure of expectations, and follow his coach Scott Simmons’ advice. 

“I have to take pressure. We are doing our best. God knows what will happen in the future. I am focusing on my training. We are not thinking too much,” said Gulveer, who is eyeing a good time in the 1,500m in an attempt to make his finishes faster. He is focusing on his speed work after a disappointing outing in the Tokyo World Championships.

While planning to compete in two major events, the Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games, this season, Gulveer relies on Simmons. “I communicate with my coach after the events. He will decide how to go about it,” said Gulveer.