Impact of Brexit on trade with India is expected to be minimal: Nirmala Sitharaman

Brexit will have minimal impact on India’s trade, the Government said today in a written reply to the Lok Sabha.

In a response to a question put forth in the Lok Sabha of the impact of Brexit on India's trade, Nirmala Sitharaman, Minister of State (MoS) for Commerce and Industry said that trade with the European Union member States and India is carried out bilaterally and not with EU as a block and the impact of Brexit on trade with India is expected to be minimal.

Sitharaman further said, “At present, there is no bilateral trade agreement that India has with EU.”

However, to a question on whether the government has conducted any study to assess the impact of Brexit on India's trade, she said no.

The government, however, reported imports from the EU during the last three years to May this year was $149.35 billion (approximately Rs 9.93 lakh crore), while exports have been a little higher at $152.99 billion (approximately Rs 10.17 lakh crore).

The questions were put forth by Ramdas C Tadas, a BJP MP and Mullappally Ramachandran, a member of parliament for Vadakara constituency belonging to CPI (Marxist).  

In an earlier article on Zeebiz.com we saw how Britain’s exit from the EU would mean an advantage for India as it would pave the way forward for India’s Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with the EU.

EU-India FTA talks have been carrying on for the past eight years as there are high demands from both parties on certain issues.

Many believe that the exit of Britain may now provide India with the upper hand in their negotiations for free trade with EU as UK is one of India's largest trading partners and investors and the EU could look to woo India by conceding to certain demands in the FTA talks.