US-India trade pact nears finish line after year of talks

President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that a US-India trade pact is “pretty close” after over a year of bargaining between the two governments.

Trump spoke to reporters in the Oval Office, when they asked if Washington and New Delhi were near an agreement. “They want to make a deal. We’re going to make a deal,” he said.

He added that it will be “a much different kind of a deal” than earlier ones, but he did not explain how. Officials in New Delhi and Washington have watched the talks for months.

What Rubio said about the US-India trade pact

Secretary of State Marco Rubio gave a similar message during his visit to India. In his words, the two sides are “about as close as you can be” without an executed agreement.

He said a small number of items remain to wrap up, and he hoped the leaders could sign soon after. He also told an Indian broadcaster that he expects the deal in weeks, not months.

Rubio stressed that he was not negotiating personally, since the trade representative handled the talks. Even so, he had followed them closely.

He said the final stage came down to technical details. Both sides had to agree that the language meant the same thing, so officials checked every word.

Rubio also explained why precision matters. A deal needs full agreement before any public statement. A relationship of this size cannot risk an accord that later collapses, he said.

Where talks stand

Back in February, both capitals presented an outline for the first phase of the pact. Later shifts in US tariffs prompted more rounds of talks on the pact, and both teams have kept working.

Earlier this month, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal sat down with US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer. They met in Milwaukee and Washington to work on the details.

Trump gave no date for finishing the talks, and he did not name the issues that still block a final deal. His remarks came at an Oval Office event on fraud in government programs. There he also spoke about trade deficits with Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

The administration argued that trading partners must give American businesses more access to their markets and cut barriers that hit US exports.

What is at stake

For India, the outcome matters to exporters of medicines, engineering goods, textiles, electronics and technology services. American companies, for their part, want more room in India’s growing consumer and manufacturing markets.

US tariff and immigration policies have strained relations. Talks also cover farm goods, industrial products and regulatory barriers, and the US-India trade pact would settle many of them.

Rubio told the Indian broadcaster that the overall outcome is largely good for India. He said he cannot wait to complete it, because the two countries can work together on many things.

For now, the US-India trade pact looks near, yet neither leader has set a signing date. Exporters on both sides wait for the final text.