The onus is on Canada to resume free trade negotiations, India’s High Commissioner to Ottawa Dinesh Patnaik has indicated.
In an interview with the network CTV, which aired on Sunday night, Patnaik said, “We will discuss with Canada if Canada is ready to sign a free trade deal with us, we will be more than happy to work with Canada. But it is the Canadians who paused it, it’s for the Canadians to restart it.”
There were several rounds of negotiations towards India and Canada towards an early progress trade agreement or EPTA, but Ottawa “paused” talks in August 2023, a month before relations ruptured when then Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated in the House of Commons that there were “credible allegations” of a potential link between Indian agents and the killing of pro-Khalistan figure Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey, British Columbia, on June 18 that year.
“Canada was one of our good friends. So there’s no reason why we can’t have a trade deal with Canada. But it’s up to Canada to decide what it wants,” he said.
While the bilateral relationship is undergoing a gradual reset, fresh talks over a trade deal have not commenced though Patnaik did indicate last month that India will be looking for a comprehensive economic partnership agreement or CEPA with Canada rather than the EPTA whenever they do resume.
The developments of the past two years continue to cast a shadow over ties. Asked whether India considered Canada a reliable supplier, Patnaik said, “Not yet.”
“We want you to be a reliable supplier, because we don’t want a situation where extraneous factors to economic activities become a deterrent,” he said, without mentioning pro-Khalistan separatists operating from Canada even once during the course of the nearly 14-minute-long interview.
Patnaik said India had “always believed Canada can be a reliable supplier” but “certain events in the past made us reconsider that.” That referred to the cratering of relations since September 2023 over the Nijjar murder.
“I hope that we can move forward,” he said, adding, “Our work is to make sure that the economic relationship is firewalled from extraneous forces which try to derail them.”
