In an official joint statement issued on January 12, United States (US) commerce Representative Ambassador Katherine Tai asked India to make sure that the end-to-end online system now in place and related rules on the import of laptops do not hinder commerce going forward.
Tai spoke during the India-US Trade Policy Forum’s (TPF) 14th Ministerial-level meeting, which took place in New Delhi on January 12. Piyush Goyal, the Indian Minister of Commerce and Industry, and Tai, the US Trade Representative, co-chaired the TPF meeting.
Ambassador Tai brought up the subject of India’s new import regulations for servers, tablets, and PCs at the meeting. In response, Goyal outlined the goals of the nation in putting these rules into effect, especially those pertaining to worries about national security.
“Ambassador Tai expressed a willingness to collaborate with India on the shared objective of supply chain resilience in this sector. India conveyed its willingness to continue engaging on this issue with the US and other interested stakeholders,” according to the statement.
The ambassador did, the statement continued, applaud India’s initiative to facilitate the implementation of the “import management system for specified IT hardware.”
On August 3, 2023, the Centre declared that it will limit the import of laptops, tablets, personal computers, ultra-small form factor PCs, and servers.
Global technology behemoths like Dell, Acer, Samsung, Panasonic, Apple, Lenovo, and HP were reported to be most harmed by such a regime.
But after a stir, the Center agreed to postpone the introduction of these limits for three months on August 4, 2023, just one day later. However, the Union administration stated in early October that, in contrast to the original plan, it would only implement an end-to-end online system by October 30, 2023.
