PM Modi, Donald Trump conform to push ahead talks on commerce deal; overseas secretary hints at tariff liberalisation | India Information – The Instances of India
NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump have agreed to advance negotiations on the Bilateral Commerce Settlement (BTA), ANI reported on Saturday citing sources. The event comes on the identical day when overseas secretary Vikram Misri hinted that New Delhi is perhaps contemplating liberalising tariffs.
This mutually helpful settlement, finalised in February 2025, goals to spice up market entry, scale back tariffs and non-tariff boundaries, and improve provide chain integration.
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To realize the objectives of the settlement, each leaders have determined to nominate senior representatives to speed up negotiations, improve commerce relations and foster financial cooperation, the sources revealed.
The BTA is predicted to impression varied sectors, together with items and companies. By growing market entry and decreasing boundaries, the settlement will facilitate smoother commerce flows and create new alternatives for companies on each side.
India hints at tariff liberalisation
A day after Trump claimed that India had agreed to carry down tariffs, overseas secretary Vikram Misri refused to touch upon the US president’s comment. He, nonetheless, added that India lately had signed a number of commerce pacts with companions primarily based on tariff liberalisation.
“There’s lots of curiosity in statements popping out of the US. I cannot get into that at this level of time as a result of these are ongoing discussions… However I might solely level you in the direction of the truth that now we have in current occasions entered into bilateral commerce agreements that are primarily based on tariff liberalisation with a number of companions,” he mentioned.
“There are ongoing discussions with a number of different companions on these points now. I believe the continued discussions must be seen in that context. That’s our common strategy and it applies to any such engagement now we have,” he added.
April 2 deadline
Sources point out that India is optimistic about resolving the tariff challenge with the US within the coming weeks, ideally earlier than the April 2 deadline.
This was mirrored within the MEA’s response on the identical, which mentioned, “Our goal via the BTA is to strengthen and deepen India-US two-way commerce throughout the products and companies sector, improve market entry, scale back tariff and non-tariff boundaries, and deepen provide chain integration between the 2 nations.”
India has already lowered its common utilized tariffs for main developed nations, together with Australia, UAE, Switzerland, and Norway, beneath not too long ago concluded commerce agreements.
Ongoing talks
A delegation, led by commerce and trade minister Piyush Goyal, had visited Washington from March 3 to six, for discussions with the US counterpart on the commerce settlement. The talks had been a part of a broader initiative to increase bilateral commerce to $500 billion by 2030, with a deal with key sectors reminiscent of vitality, protection, and know-how.
“Commerce and trade minister (Piyush Goyal) was in US and met his counterparts. Our goal via the BTA is to strengthen and deepen India-US two-way commerce throughout the products and companies sector, improve market entry, scale back tariff and non-tariff boundaries, and deepen provide chain integration between the 2 nations,” MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal had mentioned on Friday.
