Trump's midterm poll setback won't derail India-US trade talks: Official

New Delhi: India and the US are continuing negotiations on the first tranche of their proposed bilateral trade agreement, with a US team visiting New Delhi earlier this month for technical discussions on customs and trade facilitation, a government official said on Tuesday.

"On November 2-3, a two-member track team on customs and trade facilitation was in New Delhi to take forward the technical part of the negotiations," the official said, adding that the two sides are in regular touch on the trade pact. The official said technical discussions on the proposed pact were expected to continue despite President Donald Trump's Republican Party losing majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives in the US midterm elections.

The results, as per another official, will not have an impact on trade pact talks. The outcome of the elections has raised some questions over the Trump administration's ability to push its trade agenda even as the president retains his executive powers.


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Earlier this year, India and the US announced the finalisation of a framework for the first phase of the proposed Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA) that saw the Trump administration scrap a 25% penalty on New Delhi for buying Russian energy and lower the baseline reciprocal tariff on India to 18%. On February 20, however, the US Supreme Court invalidated Trump's reciprocal tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

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Washington has since levied an additional 10% duty on Indian goods under Section 301 probe on alleged forced labour concerns. The duty, also imposed on 16 other countries, is lower than the 12.5% tariff the US proposed in June as part of a broader probe under Section 301 of its Trade Act. The US is separately probing New Delhi's alleged excess capacity under Section 301.

New Delhi is seeking lower tariffs for its goods in the US market than its competitor nations such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia.