New Delhi: At a time when the US and China are involved in trade war, India for the second time has extended the deadline for the imposition of higher customs duties on 29 products, including almond, walnut and pulses, imported from United States till November 2.
India and the US are involved in trade negotiations since June to look at ways to resolve each others concerns.
There is hope that a comprehensive deal may be worked out in coming days. In this context India wants to give some time to resolve disputes with United States.
In June, India had hit back at Donald Trump’s protectionist policies, hiking customs duty on 29 products. However, these duties had to come into effect from August but it was then postponed to September 18.
US companies are keen to tap Indian market which is one of the fastest growing major economy in the world. US retail giant Walmart recently took a majority deal in Flipkart in a $ 16 billion deal.
India has also proposed to buy petroleum products from the United States to help narrow the trade deficit.
The US has also emerged as a top arms supplier to India and US firms are bidding for military aircraft deals worth billions of dollars.
Trade differences have been rising since Donald Trump took office. India’s action was in response to US’ decision to raise tariff on steel and aluminium products earlier this year which had an tariff impact of $241 million on India.
The duty hiked by India was supposed to have an equivalent tariff implications for the US.
