NEW DELHI: President Donald Trump announced reciprocal tariffs on India starting April 2, signaling a tough path ahead in the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations, which could clash with these sweeping tariffs.New Delhi, however, remains hopeful that the understanding reached between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Trump on February 13 will help resolve trade issues and keep the September deadline for signing the first tranche of the FTA. Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has began his US trip on Monday to meet the new United States Trade Representative (USTR), Jamieson Greer.In his first address of his second term to a joint session of Congress, President Trump defended his strict tariff policies, highlighting that the US has long faced high tariffs from several countries, including India. He announced that his administration would impose reciprocal tariffs on several countries starting April 2.“On average, the European Union, China, Brazil, India, Mexico and Canada have you heard of them? And countless other nations charge us tremendously high tariffs than we charge them, It’s very unfair,” Trump said. Trump had previously referred to India as a “tariff king” and highlighted the auto sector, saying that India imposes tariffs of over 100 percent. “India charges us 100 per cent tariffs; the system is not fair to the US, it never was. On April 2, reciprocal tariffs kick in. Whatever they tax us, we will tax them. If they use non-monetary tariffs to keep us out of their market, then we will use non-monetary barriers to keep them out of our market,” Trump said.
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