London:  The former British minister has revealed her own reasons as to why the much-awaited free trade agreement (FTA) between India and Britain has not been signed yet. Former UK Trade and Commerce Minister Kemi Badenoch has claimed that she had deliberately blocked the India-UK Free Trade Agreement (FTA) due to the demand for more visas. Badenoch is the frontrunner to replace Rishi Sunak as Conservative Party chief and Leader of the Opposition. Nigerian-born Badenoch said that one of the reasons for the Sunak-led Tory government not signing the FTA was that the Indian side was expecting more concessions on the issue of migration.

According to The Telegraph, Badenoch said, "As trade minister, when I was trying to do something to limit migration, we had the issue of an FTA with India under which they were asking for more concessions in terms of migration, but I refused. This is one of the reasons why we did not sign it." However, some of her former Tory cabinet colleagues contradicted Badenoch's claim in The Times, saying that this was unlikely, as she was pushing for the deal at any cost, which was expected to significantly increase the bilateral trade partnership by GBP 38 billion per year.

Why is FTA stuck?

The report quoted a former cabinet minister as saying, "Kemi wanted to reach a deal at any cost and did not think the objections being put forward were serious." A former minister was quoted as saying in this regard, "Kemi wanted an achievement to show the post-Brexit benefits and she was excited to achieve it." The former minister said, "The reality was that the Indians had all the bargaining power and their influence in the negotiations was more than ours. We were under a lot of pressure to do all the work and they were quite careless in terms of making the deal. This was where the balance of power was and we always started from a weak position."

Was Badenoch ready to sign the agreement?

It is also being said that Badenoch was not ready to sign the agreement at any cost. A source close to her denied Badenoch's claim of being ready. He said that the Indian government decided not to sign the agreement with the Conservative government in the hope that it might be able to negotiate better terms under a Labour Party government. 'The Times' quoted the source as saying, "Kemi did not want to do any deal that would change Britain's immigration rules. This is absolutely false, she would never do this. India did not do this because it knew that under a Labour government it would get better concessions on students and social security."

What is the stance of new PM Keir Starmer

Reports from India indicate that FTA talks are set to resume next month under the Labour Party government led by new UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and that UK officials are not setting any timeline for speeding it up after 14 rounds of talks. "We remain committed to reaching a trade deal with India and intend to resume negotiations as soon as possible," Starmer's foreign affairs spokesman said this week. Sunak resigned as party chief in July after his party's crushing defeat. Sunak's successor will be announced on November 2.