Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday said India wants a fair, equitable, balanced trade deal with the US and it will not compromise on the interests of farmers, fishermen, and the dairy sector.
He said India and the US are negotiating a good proposed bilateral trade agreement.
"We are working for a good trade deal in the interest of India. At the same time, India is not going to compromise the interests of our farmers, fishermen, workers, labour, and our dairy... We are working on a fair equitable and balanced trade deal," he said here at Udyog Samagam 2025 -- a conference of industries and commerce ministers of states.
"We want a fair, equitable and balanced trade deal (with the US). If that happens, it could happen any day, it could happen tomorrow, it may happen next month, it may happen next year... But as a government, we are preparing for everything," he said.
He also said India is looking for new markets such as Russia for the country's fishery sector, which is facing issues due to the steep tariffs in the US.
India and the US are negotiating a bilateral trade agreement. So far, five rounds of talks have been completed. Both sides have announced to finalise the first tranche of the deal by fall of 2025.
Meanwhile, an official said another round of negotiations may not be necessary.
"They (US) have to get back to us. India's negotiations have been the most comprehensive, most detailed, WTO-compliant compared to any other country. May be it took time, but we negotiated very cautiously, keeping in view the interests of our sensitive sectors," the official added.
A team of Indian officials, headed by Commerce Secretary Rajesh Agrawal, was in Washington last month to hold trade talks with their US counterparts. The three-day talks ended on October 17.
Negotiations for the pact are important, as relations between the two countries have been under severe strain since the US President Donald Trump administration imposed a steep 50 per cent tariff on Indian goods. It includes a 25 per cent additional import duty for buying Russian crude oil.
The proposed pact aims to more than double the bilateral trade to USD 500 billion by 2030 from the current USD 191 billion.
The US remained India's largest trading partner for the fourth consecutive year in 2024-25, with bilateral trade valued at USD 131.84 billion (USD 86.5 billion exports). It accounts for about 18 per cent of India's total goods exports, 6.22 per cent in imports, and 10.73 per cent in the country's total merchandise trade.
India's merchandise exports to the US declined 11.93 per cent to USD 5.46 billion in September due to the high tariffs imposed by Washington, while imports increased 11.78 per cent to USD 3.98 billion during the month, according to commerce ministry data.
US President Donald Trump has said the US is "pretty close" to reaching a "fair trade deal" with India, adding that he will lower the tariffs imposed on Indian goods at "some point".
This is the second time in less than two weeks that the US president held out hope to seal the proposed bilateral trade deal with India.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
