India eyes early trade deal with US before July 9
Negotiations underway with EU on finalising FTA before close of 2025
- Jun 16, 2025,
- Updated Jun 16, 2025 4:51 PM IST
India is hopeful of completing an initial trade agreement with the US before July 9 with officials underlining that there has been good progress on the talks.
“We are working on an early trade deal with the US. The progress has been good. We are hopeful that this will be done within the timeline,” said Commerce Secretary Sunil Barthwal on Monday.
The 90-day pause on reciprocal tariffs by the US will come to an end on July 9.
Rajesh Agarwal, Special Secretary, Department of Commerce, who is also the chief negotiator for India for the BTA with the US, noted that the US team was in India for six days from June 5 to 11. “There is progress towards the target of finalising the first tranche of the trade deal by the fall of 2025,” he said.
While officials remained tight-lipped over other details of the proposed trade pact, they noted that both countries will have to reduce tariffs and increase market access to meet the target of doubling bilateral trade to $500 billion by 2050.
Expectations are that the India and the US will announce an early trade deal focussing largely on lower tariffs as well as non-tariff barriers before the July 9 deadline. The US has proposed a 26% reciprocal tariff on India, including a 10% baseline duty.
While the current US Administration does not have Congressional mandate for trade deals, it is expected that the government will use other measures to lower tariffs and finalise the pact with India.
Meanwhile, India is also working on concluding the negotiations for the free trade agreement with the European Union and the next round of talks are scheduled from July 7. “The momentum has picked up and the frequency of meetings has increased. Both countries are trying to find convergence on a large number of issues,” officials said.
Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal who visited Switzerland and Sweden from June 9 to 13 had expressed confidence that India is on track to seal the FTA with the 27-nation bloc before the close of calendar 2025. Goyal had noted that that significant progress has already been made; more than half of the negotiation chapters have been finalised, and teams are roughly 90 per cent ready on market-access provisions.
India is hopeful of completing an initial trade agreement with the US before July 9 with officials underlining that there has been good progress on the talks.
“We are working on an early trade deal with the US. The progress has been good. We are hopeful that this will be done within the timeline,” said Commerce Secretary Sunil Barthwal on Monday.
The 90-day pause on reciprocal tariffs by the US will come to an end on July 9.
Rajesh Agarwal, Special Secretary, Department of Commerce, who is also the chief negotiator for India for the BTA with the US, noted that the US team was in India for six days from June 5 to 11. “There is progress towards the target of finalising the first tranche of the trade deal by the fall of 2025,” he said.
While officials remained tight-lipped over other details of the proposed trade pact, they noted that both countries will have to reduce tariffs and increase market access to meet the target of doubling bilateral trade to $500 billion by 2050.
Expectations are that the India and the US will announce an early trade deal focussing largely on lower tariffs as well as non-tariff barriers before the July 9 deadline. The US has proposed a 26% reciprocal tariff on India, including a 10% baseline duty.
While the current US Administration does not have Congressional mandate for trade deals, it is expected that the government will use other measures to lower tariffs and finalise the pact with India.
Meanwhile, India is also working on concluding the negotiations for the free trade agreement with the European Union and the next round of talks are scheduled from July 7. “The momentum has picked up and the frequency of meetings has increased. Both countries are trying to find convergence on a large number of issues,” officials said.
Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal who visited Switzerland and Sweden from June 9 to 13 had expressed confidence that India is on track to seal the FTA with the 27-nation bloc before the close of calendar 2025. Goyal had noted that that significant progress has already been made; more than half of the negotiation chapters have been finalised, and teams are roughly 90 per cent ready on market-access provisions.