Desi Talk

www.desitalk.com – that’s all you need to know 5 INDIA February 6, 2026 T he Trump administration is working to put the details of its trade deal with India announced on Monday on paper, but it will reduce India’s tariffs on American industrial goods to zero from 13.5% and eliminate duties but allow India to maintain some agricultural import protections, U.S. Trade Repre- sentative Jamieson Greer said on Tuesday. Greer told CNBC in a live interview that the U.S. would continue to work on access to certain protected areas of India’s agriculture sector, but said India’s tariffs “for a variety of things, you know, tree nuts, wine, spirits, fruits, vegetables, etc, they’re going down to zero.” He did not mention rice, beef, soybeans, sugar or dairy, which are commodities that India excluded from its recent trade deal with the European Union. Greer confirmed that the deal would reduce the U.S. tariff on most Indian goods to 18% from 50% because of the size and growth of India’s trade surplus with the U.S. That reached $53.5 billion during the first 11 months of 2025, up from $45.8 billion for all of 2024, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Greer said that the Trump administration reached an “understanding and an agreement with the Indians as well on a variety of technical barriers to trade, areas where they have not accepted U.S. standards. We know American goods are safe.” He said there would be “a process for recognizing U.S. standards” but that India would have to go through its own political processes for accepting these standards, adding that it would open up a market of more than 1 bil- lion people to more U.S. goods. Regarding India’s agreement to wind down Russian crude oil imports, he said that prior to 2022 and 2023, India did not import Russian oil and has been work- ing since late last year to wind down imports. India was “making the right choice” to diversify its energy purchas- es to the U.S. and Venezuela. He did not specify a start date for the tariff changes, saying that the process for making it official was under- way. “We’ll finish papering it, but we know the specifics, we know the details,” Greer said. He added that India is maintaining some protection around agricultural goods.. -Reuters US Trade Chief Says India To Maintain Some Agriculture Protections In Deal With Trump PHOTO:REUTERS/Rupak De Chowdhuri A farmer sprays insecticide on his cauliflower field in Kolkata, India, December 19, 2016. I ndia said on Sunday foreign companies using data centres built in the country to provide services to global clients will not face any taxes for doing so for more than 20 years, hoping to assuage concerns of possible tax liabilities on the sector. Scores of data centres have been built in India in re- cent years, but lawyers told Reuters that foreign compa- nies had been concerned that New Delhi could in future impose taxes on their global income for using a data centre located in the country. Those concerns were set to rest by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her 2026-27 budget speech, where she said India will “provide (a) tax holiday till 2047 to any foreign companies that provide cloud services to their customers globally, by using data centre services from India.” Vaibhav Gupta, partner at tax firm Dhruva Advisors, said: “This announcement helps in bringing clarity to for- eign companies and lends stability in (their) tax position in India till 2047,” noting foreign companies would no longer need to worry about potential taxes on their global income on the basis they use a data centre in India. Google said in October it will invest $15 billion in an AI data centre project in Andhra Pradesh state, while Micro- soft and Amazon have poured billions into data centres in India. Indian conglomerates like Adani and Reliance are also investing. Amazon, Microsoft and Google did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the government’s tax measure. “Data centres will be a major strength for India through which we can provide new services to the world,” IT minister Ashwini Vaishnav told reporters. -Reuters I ndian shares jumped to post their best day in nine months on Tuesday, led by Reliance and heavyweight financials, while export-oriented stocks powered a broad rally after the India–U.S. trade deal removed a key market overhang. Both benchmarks surged about 5% in early trade. At close, the Nifty 50 settled 2.55% higher at 25,727.55 points, while the BSE Sensex gained 2.54% to 83,739.13, to log their strongest single-session rise since May 2025. U.S. President Donald Trump on Mon- day announced a trade deal with India that slashes U.S. tariffs on Indian goods to 18% from 50% in exchange for New Delhi halting Russian oil purchases and lower- ing trade barriers. All 16 major sectors logged gains, while the broader small-caps and mid-caps jumped 2.8% each. Forty-six of the Nifty 50 constituents advanced. Index heavyweight Reliance Industries jumped 3.4%. Top private lenders HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank rose 2.2% and 2.7%, leading the benchmark rally. The rupee strengthened against the dollar, posting its best day in seven years on expectations that the deal will lure foreign fund inflows towards Indian assets after sustained outflows over the last year. “Higher tariffs on Indian goods had raised a balance-of-payments risk, contributing to rupee depreciation and triggering foreign outflows in a self-feed- ing cycle,” said Peeyush Mittal, portfolio manager at Matthews Asia, adding that the trade deal breaks the loop and will lend stability to rupee and stocks. The delay in the India-U.S. trade deal, lack of exposure to emerging themes such as artificial intelligence and muted earn- ings were the key reasons for the foreign selling in Indian stocks, since the start of 2025. Foreign portfolio investors have offloaded shares worth about $23 billion since the start of 2025, triggering a rare underperformance compared with Asian and emerging market peers. “The trade deal announcement does change the immediate outlook on India and sets a positive tone, which is good for equities in the short to medium term,” said Vineet Arora, managing director at NAV Capital Emerging Star fund, a Singapore-based foreign investor. Export-linked sectors such as auto ancillaries, textiles, apparel, jewellery, IT, pharma, seafood, engineering goods, re- newables, speciality chemicals, electron- ics manufacturers will find their flavour again, Arora said. On the day, all the export-linked sectors surged. Eternal gained 2.6% on inclusion into Jefferies’ model India portfolio, with the brokerage terming it a “FPI favourite”. Adani Ports climbed 9.1% on raising the upper end of its core earnings forecast for the current fiscal. -Reuters India Gives 20-Year Tax Holiday To Foreign Firms Using Local Data Centres Indian Shares Notch Best Day In 9 Months As Reliance, Financials Surge After US Trade Deal By Aditi Shah and Dhwani Pandya By Bharath Rajeswaran and Vivek Kumar M