Senate Finance Committee leaders Friday urged the U.S. State Secretary John Kerry to press India to reverse government actions, which they said threatened millions of American jobs in information technology, pharmaceutical and creative industries during his forthcoming visit to India.
"We cannot afford to sit back and watch as India adopts policies that adversely impact U.S. innovative and creative industries, and threaten the greater stability of the international trading system," said the top Democrat and Republican on the Panel according to the Reuters.
The U.S. industry leaders' call for a change in Indian policies shows Washington's growing frustration with the Indian trade practices.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufactures along with other 15 business groups in the country last week wrote a letter to President Barack Obama, which said that "India is discriminating against a wide range of U.S. exports."
"Over the last year, the courts and policymakers in India have engaged in a persistent pattern of discrimination designed to benefit India's business community at the expense of American jobs. Administrative and court rulings have repeatedly ignored internationally recognised rights - imposing arbitrary marketing restrictions on medical devices and denying, breaking, or revoking patents for nearly a dozen lifesaving medications," said the letter addressed to the president.
Criticizing India's policy of "compulsory licenses" for foreign companies to trade in India, the committee also said that India's high rates of copyright piracy also hurt sales of U.S. books, movies, software, information products and telecommunications equipment.
"U.S. companies are losing major market opportunities in India, and other countries are watching to see how the United States reacts to India's actions as they consider the adoption of similar policies," said the senators.
According to the officials in New Delhi, the U.S. Secretary of State will be in India on June 23 and 24.
