India and the US have sorted out the bulk of the issues relating to the proposed trade deal, including tariff lines, and the deal could be sealed "soon" as talks continue to resolve the last stretch of concerns, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Saturday.
India and the US have worked out a majority of their contentions regarding the planned trade deal, which also includes tariff lines, with the pact being put into effect "soon" amid discussions ongoing to reconcile the last stretch of difference, according to a statement from the External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Saturday.
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This announcements comes a month prior to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's anticipated visit to the US to attend the G20 summit. The meeting is expected to provide an opportunity for him and US President Donald Trump to review the broader trajectory of bilateral relations and assess progress on the proposed trade agreement.
Speaking at an interactive session at the HT Leadership Summit, the external affairs minister said negotiations are nearing the "finishing line". He added that many of the outstanding issues are not on India's side and that more changes have taken place on the American side.
"Well, it's certainly our hope, and in many ways anticipation that we are at the last stretch. That's not a secret," he said responding to a question on the negotiations for the trade pact.
There has been speculation that India and the US may announce the trade deal following talks between Modi and Trump on the sidelines of the G20 Summit, to be held in Miami on Dec. 14 and 15.
Jaishankar said his understanding has been that the bulk of the issues were sorted out. "There is the last stretch of issues and in many cases these concerns are not so much at our end, because the changes have been more at the American end than our end."
"The hope is that we should close it out soon. It's always the case that in that last period, everybody's impatient," he noted.
Last month, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in Mumbai that both sides are very close to firm up the trade deal.
India and the US have been engaged in talks since early 2025 on the proposed trade pact to address tariff friction, eliminate non-tariff barriers, and boost bilateral market access. India is seeking better tariffs than its competitors for its goods in the US market.
"For us the key is that we want a trade deal which is beneficial, it is balanced and which would give us a comparative advantage over groups of comparable economies," Jaishankar said.
"That is really what we are looking for and that is really our expectation of where we would be when the trade deal is done." he said.
The external affairs minister also called for looking at the proposed trade pact from a "larger perspective" of both countries.
"In our case, many of our early (trade) deals were done with Asian economies and many of those Asian economies were actually competitive economies. The gains which people expected from those FTAs (free trade agreements) did not exactly materialise," he said.
"Today, think if you look at the FTAs which have been done in the last few years, I think they've been much more thought through. They've been much more strategically and economically assessed," he said.
Jaishankar said the US is India's biggest market and having the trade deal with it would benefit the country.
"When you look at this big context and say there is the US, our biggest market in a way, the world's largest economy, obviously having a trade deal with such an economy would benefit us."
"For the US, President Trump is obviously looking to do a whole set of bilateral deals to improve markets for himself. Now, the challenge is to find a landing point," he said.
"I think this is not something which could have been done quickly and magically with sort of bold thinking and rapid movement, because these are very serious issues, people's jobs and people's lives are at stake."
The external affairs minister also suggested that issues relating to tariffs were sorted out.
"If you are serious, you go tariff line by tariff line. That takes time. Now we've done it the painstaking way. Not everybody has had the patience or frankly the understanding to bear with it.
"But I think having put in that effort, we have now reached almost the finishing line. I think bear with it and hopefully we'll get it," he said.
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If the trade deal is finalised, then it could trigger an upswing in the overall trajectory of bilateral ties. The India-US relations witnessed a major downturn after Washington imposed punitive tariffs on India last year and President Trump made assertions regarding his role in de-escalating the India-Pakistan military clashes of May 2025 that drew sharp reaction from Indian officials.
Washington's new immigration policy and its decision to increase H1B visa fee also contributed to the slide in India-US ties.
The ties came under fresh strain after the US decided to restrict a key green-card processing programme for major global and Indian IT firms, including Tata Consultancy Services and Wipro.
(With PTI Inputs)
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