New Delhi
India and the US have agreed to “remain engaged” after three days of trade talks in Washington concluded on Wednesday, a commerce ministry statement said — signalling that the finalisation of an interim bilateral deal awaits the Trump administration instituting a legally tenable tariff framework after the US Supreme Court struck down the basis of reciprocal tariffs in February.
The Indian delegation, led by chief negotiator Darpan Jain, discussed “multiple areas such as market access, non-tariff measures, technical barriers to trade, customs and trade facilitation, investment promotion, economic security alignment and digital trade,” the ministry said on Friday. The meetings were conducted in a “constructive and positive spirit” with “meaningful and forward-looking discussions” enabling progress on key matters, it added.
The round was the first face-to-face meeting since the two countries agreed on a framework for an interim deal on February 7. “The framework reaffirmed the countries’ commitment to the broader India-US Bilateral Trade Agreement negotiations,” the ministry said. “Both sides agreed to remain engaged to maintain this momentum as they move forward.”
Days before the delegation’s departure, commerce secretary Rajesh Agrawal had said both parties were looking at finalising a legal agreement as a logical follow-up of the February 7 joint statement. “There is a need for further discussions and follow-up engagement to take this forward,” he said.
At a hearing before the House ways and means committee on Tuesday, USTR Jamieson Greer confirmed that Indian negotiators were in Washington and that the two sides were actively discussing specific commodities, including dried distillers’ grains, soybean meal and ethanol. “India is a tough nut to crack. They’ve protected their agricultural markets for a very long time. As part of this deal, they’re going to want to protect a lot of that still. There are things though where I think we can find mutual agreement,” he said.
India’s foreign ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal on Thursday said the talks were “ongoing and constructive.” “Both sides are working towards a balanced, mutually beneficial and forward-looking trade agreement, taking into account each other’s concerns and priorities, and to achieve a trade target of $500 billion by 2030,” he said. That target would be more than double bilateral goods and services trade of roughly $212 billion in 2024.
The negotiations are proceeding on two broad tracks: establishing a legally tenable tariff architecture following the Supreme Court’s ruling, and securing India’s comparative advantage over competing exporters such as China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Indonesia. The uniform tariff currently in force under Section 122 — applicable to all countries equally — gives India no edge over its rivals. “The uniform tariff of 10% does not give India any comparative advantage,” one person familiar with the matter said.
The need to rebuild the agreement on firm legal ground has been the central challenge since the Supreme Court on February 20 struck down Trump’s sweeping global tariffs as exceeding his statutory authority — a ruling that invalidated the proposed 18% tariff on Indian goods that had been the cornerstone of the February 7 framework. The administration has since imposed a temporary 15% uniform tariff on all imports under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, valid for 150 days and set to expire in July. Washington has also launched Section 301 investigations into alleged excess industrial capacity against 16 economies, including India, which the ongoing talks are expected to help resolve.
