India’s stance on U.S. trade deal is that we should get preferential access as was agreed: Piyush Goyal

As one year elapses of U.S. President Donald Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariff announcement, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal says India and the U.S. continue to have a “very robust and deep” strategic partnership and that India’s current stance is that it should receive preferential market access to the U.S. compared to its competitors, as was agreed to in the joint statement between the two countries.

The ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs were announced on April 2, 2025. Under these, Indian exports to the U.S. would have attracted a tariff of 26%. Over the last year, however, a lot has changed: the tariffs were paused, reinstated, hiked to 50%, reduced again to 25%, promised to be reduced to 18% post a trade deal, invalidated by the U.S. Supreme Court, and then temporarily set at 10% for all countries. 

“India and the U.S. share a very robust and deep strategic partnership on many aspects such as technology, defence, trade, and investment,” Mr. Goyal told reporters on Thursday (April 2, 2026). “India’s approach is that we should get preferential market access, as was agreed to in the joint statement [in February 2026] as compared to our competitors.”

He also spoke about his meeting with his counterpart from China, the first such meeting since India walked away in September 2019 from joining the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). Mr. Goyal said the meeting was a “good start” towards enhancing trade and investment between the two countries.

Trade deal in limbo

India and the U.S. on February 13 issued a joint statement on the framework for an interim trade agreement. As per this statement, the U.S. was to reduce tariffs on India from 50% to 18%. However, a week later, the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated the mechanism through which Mr. Trump had imposed these tariffs. 

Since then, Mr. Trump has imposed a temporary 10% tariff on imports from all its trading partners. 

According to former Director General of Foreign Trade and founder of the think-tank Global Trade Research Institute Ajay Srivastava, the Supreme Court’s decision should encourage India to revisit the deal. 

“The February 20 ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States striking down reciprocal tariffs has removed the core leverage behind these [trade] agreements, removing any incentive for honoring trade deals on earlier terms,” Mr. Srivastava said. “India should also reassess its position.” 

He further highlighted that the India-U.S. joint statement explicitly includes a provision for a revisit of commitments if one side modifies its tariffs.

Sources in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry said that the ball is currently in the U.S.’ court.

“They are the ones under the deadline, not us,” an official explained, requesting anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue. “The 10% tariffs they have imposed were only for six months. We are clear. If they finally arrive at a tariff system where we get preferential access, then we are ready to talk again regarding the trade deal.”

Other FTAs coming soon

Mr. Goyal also said that New Zealand’s Minister for Trade Todd McClay will be visiting India in the fourth week of April to sign an FTA. He also said that he was in discussions with the government in Oman to bring into effect the India-Oman Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) on May 1, 2026.

Mr. Goyal said that he and his counterpart in Brazil have instructed their respective teams to “speed up” the process of expanding the existing preferential trade agreement between India and the MERCOSUR grouping of countries.

Commerce Secretary Rajesh Agrawal, also speaking at the same event, told reporters that India and Chile have agreed to conclude negotiations on an FTA in the “next few months”. Regarding the FTA negotiations with Peru, however, Mr. Agrawal said that the talks were “stuck due to a mismatch of aspirations”.