India-US trade negotiators begin four-day talks from today

NEW DELHI, May 31: The chief negotiators of the US and India will begin four-day talks here on Monday on finalising the details of the interim trade pact, whose framework was agreed upon in February.

The US team will be led by its chief negotiator Brendan Lynch. India's chief negotiator is Darpan Jain, who is an additional secretary in the Department of Commerce.

The two sides are "proposed to finalise the details of the interim agreement and take forward the negotiations under the broader BTA on multiple areas such as market access, non-tariff measures, customs and trade facilitation, investment promotion, and economic security alignment," the commerce ministry has said.

On February 7, India and the US issued a joint statement finalising the contours or framework of the first phase of the bilateral trade agreement (BTA) or an interim trade agreement. Now, both sides will have to finalise the legal text for that deal.

The framework reaffirmed the countries' commitment to the broader India-US BTA negotiations.
According to that framework, the US had agreed to reduce tariffs on India to 18 per cent from 50 per cent. It had removed the 25 per cent tariffs on Indian goods for buying Russian oil and was to cut the remaining 25 per cent to 18 per cent under the pact.

But, on February 20 this year, the US Supreme Court ruled against President Donald Trump's sweeping reciprocal tariffs, which were imposed under the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).    �"HT