US President Trump to end trade privileges for India on June 5
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Trump had announced his intention to remove India from the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program in early March.
In a blow to India, US President Donald Trump on Friday said that the United States would end its preferential trade treatment for India on June 5, reported news agency Reuters.
Trump had announced his intention to remove India from the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program in early March.
"I have determined that India has not assured the United States that India will provide equitable and reasonable access to its markets," Reuters report said Trump as saying in a statement on Friday.
India is the biggest beneficiary of the GSP, which allows preferential duty-free imports of up to $5.6 billion from the South Asian nation, the report added.
Indian officials have raised the prospect of higher import duties on more than 20 US goods if Trump drops India from the programme.
Twenty-four members of the US Congress sent the administration a letter on May 3 urging it not to terminate India's access to the GSP.
Trump had time and again called India 'tariff king' and imposes "tremendously high" import duties on American goods.