India, UK have some distance to go on trade deal: Report

India and the United Kingdom have not been able to come to common grounds regarding concession on duties imposed by India on liquor and car imports, Reuters reported citing a government official. The newswire has learned from a second government source, that the UK is asking India to accept investment protection clauses, either as a part of this or as a separate deal.

A person in the know informed Reuters that the UK has demanded that investor protection be on the table if talks have to progress toward finalisation of a transaction.

Both India and UK are targeting double bilateral trade by 2030 through this deal, the newswire reported.

The main cause of contention regarding investment protection is the UK’s insistence on an allowance for international arbitration in case a dispute comes up, bypassing taking the matter up with Indian courts first, the second government official told the newswire, which is not agreeable with the Indian government, as per a third official.

A fourth official has informed Reuters that November was kept as a soft deadline, but from the looks of it, it seems like it will take at least a year. Two persons in the know also told Reuters that both, UK and India have eliminated the likelihood of an interim deal.

Reuters could not get comments from India’s various ministries of external affairs, finance, and trade. UK’s Department of Business and Trade said that they would only ink a pact when the transaction was ‘fair and in interests of the UK’s economy and people’.