The shadow foreign secretary of the UK and leader of the Labour party David Lammy has declared a strong commitment to ink a free trade agreement with India and emphasized on the strengthening of a strategic partnership with the country.
Furthermore, he also slammed the conservative government for ‘overpromising’ and ‘underdelivering’ with regard to India.
Talking about the deal at India Global Forum in London, David said, ‘We need a reset and relaunch of our relationship because…it is our view that Conservatives time and time again, overpromised and underdeliver when it comes to India.’
He also called on finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman and commerce minister Piyush Goyal to finalize the trade deal.
‘Many Diwalis have come and gone without a trade deal and too many businesses have been left waiting…My message to Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Minister Goyal is that Labour is ready to go. Let’s finally get our free trade deal done, finished, over and move on.’ said UK’s shadow foreign secretary.
David Lammy emphasized that more needs to be done regarding the India-UK relationship.
‘The relationship between the United Kingdom and India, has to go beyond whoever is in office, it’s just too important and too big…UK-India Strategic Partnership that focusses on economic security, domestic security and global security’ said Lammy.
Later, he also congratulated Prime minister Narendra Modi for his third consecutive victory in 2024 Lok Sabha Elections and praised India’s democratic institutions.
Earlier, the commerce ministry constituted Chintan Shivir to give information regarding FTA to stakeholders and officials.
About FTA Agreement With UK
The Free Trade Agreement refers to an upcoming trade deal between two countries-India & UK. Which is likely to be signed after the conclusions of election.
The negotiations between both the countries started in the month of January 2022.
Though this agreement, it aims to secure a beneficial outcome, with regard to bilateral trade. Which currently stands at 38.1 billion GBP.
So far, around 13 rounds of talks have been conducted over India-UK FTA agreement. The 14th round of talks began on January 10, 2024.