ISDS Case Map
India
As India grapples with the Vodafone and 2G fallout, the Bilateral Investment Treaties it signed a few years ago are coming back to haunt it.
Almost a year after he visited Pakistan to lay the foundation for a change in trade relations between the two neighbours, commerce secretary Rahul Khullar tells Sidhartha things have moved faster than anticipated.
Mr Richard White, New Zealand Trade Commissioner to India, has said his country is expecting to conclude the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with India by next year.
India plans to abolish the investor-state dispute system and renegotiate FTAs with South Korea, Singapore, and other countries, an Indian newspaper reported.
India will not concede to EU's demand that European companies be allowed to participate in procurements made by public sector enterprises in the country as part of a free trade agreement being negotiated.
The government has decided to exclude financial services from the SAARC agreement on trade in services, following strong objection from the Reserve Bank of India, or RBI. The central bank has argued that India has already allowed access to foreign banks under the World Trade Organization agreement.
India and Pakistan will soon begin discussions on a preferential trading arrangement to lower import duties on an array of goods. The talks will be held under ambit of South Asia Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) signed eight years ago between member states of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), a senior Indian official said on Saturday.
The Indian government is likely to oppose any move by Vodafone Plc to invoke the India-Netherlands Bilateral Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (BIPA) if it is forced to cough up Rs 12,000 crore in taxes on the grounds that the investment was routed through several step down firms based in different countries and that the treaty does not cover tax disputes.
Fearing the Indian government will use new tax laws to trap it back around Rs 12,000 crore in taxes, the world’s largest mobile operator, Vodafone, may invoke a bilateral investment treaty between India and the Netherlands to avoid doing so.
Norway's Telenor will seek 'compensation for all investment, guarantees and damages' if the Indian government fails to sort out issues related to its licence cancellation within the next six months, the company said.
