The Trump administration has shown it is more open to forging a stronger partnership with India, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said.
New Delhi: In a bid to further bolster India-US ties, both nations are holding “very active” and “intense” discussions on trade, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said, adding that there is a strong “business case” for a bilateral trade agreement (BTA) between the two countries.
Following talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Donald Trump in Washington, DC last month, the two sides announced to negotiate the first tranche of the BTA by the fall of 2025. In an interactive session hosted by Asia Society, Jaishankar said “There’s a very active and intense trade discussion going on at this point of time”.
“On trade, we had a very open discussion and it is the result of the decision by PM (Narendra) Modi and US President (Donald) Trump to have a bilateral trade agreement by fall this year,” Jaishankar told the gathering. “I have every confidence that they (negotiators) will negotiate what is the best possible deal for us. While noting the concerns, I wouldn’t prejudge the outcome. I would wait and see really what happens in terms of our ability to reach an understanding with the United States,” he added.
On strategic ties with the US, Jaishankar said New Delhi is certainly expecting a “more substantial” and “higher quality” defense relationship under the Trump administration. “We saw a President who is much more open and much more active in terms of building a security and defense partnership,” he said, suggesting that the Trump administration is more forthcoming in sharing American technologies with India.
Jaishankar said New Delhi is also looking at boosting its energy ties with the US and making sure that there's a "stable, reasonable, predictable" energy environment that is something crucial to India's long-term growth and development.
“Now, we saw a President who clearly had an interest in ensuring that energy availability was more, energy flows were more diverse, and that countries like India could have more choice than we currently do,” he said. The External Affairs Minister recalled that India started importing LNG from the US decades ago.
On Trump’s policies, Jaishankar said “Overall, our assessment was that we saw many changes which suited us or which in some way formed convergence on which we could build upon,” he added.
The US was the largest trading partner of India with overall bilateral trade in goods and services amounting to $190 billion for the calendar year 2023. In the financial year 2023-24, the US was the third largest source of foreign direct investment (FDI) into India with inflows of $4.99 billion accounting for almost per cent of total FDI equity inflows.
US won’t club India with China, Canada on tariffsIndia will not be treated like China, Mexico, and Canada, trade officials from the US have indicated to their counterparts in Delhi, where they held their first in-person meeting this week to negotiate a bilateral trade agreement – a process now put on “fast track”. The hectic parleys come against the backdrop of the looming April 2 deadline when the US is due to enforce reciprocal tariffs. “It is now amply clear that the Trump administration does not club India with countries like China, Mexico, and Canada. There is a difference,” according to reports. The talks began with the US team led by assistant trade representative Brendan Lynch and the Indian delegation headed by the commerce ministry’s additional secretary, Rajesh Agarwal. The discussions were “progressing in a cordial spirit and the outcome is expected to be satisfying for both the governments”. On February 13, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Trump pledged to increase Indo-US bilateral trade from approximately $200 billion to $500 billion (Mission 500) by 2030 and decided to forge a BTA by autumn 2025. |
