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Published 19:24 IST, April 4th 2019

Trump calls India a "Tariff King", alleges saying its one of the highest taxing nations

US President Donald Trump on Thursday alleged that India is one of the highest taxing nations in the world. He criticized the country for imposing 100% tariffs on American products, including Harley-Davidson motorcycles.

Reported by: Digital Desk
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US President Donald Trump on Thursday alleged that India is one of the highest taxing nations in the world. He criticized the country for imposing 100% tariffs on American products, including Harley-Davidson motorcycles.

During the National Republican Congressional Committee Annual Spring Dinner, Trump showed his discontent saying that such high tariffs imposed on goods by India are unfair.

Early this year, at a White House event to announce his support for the reciprocal tax, Trump had said he was satisfied with India's decision to reduce the import tariff on Harley-Davidson motorcycles from 100% to 50%.

"Even this is not enough, this is okay," he said at that time

India has been repeatedly slammed by the US President claiming that the country is a “tariff king” and imposes “tremendously high” tariffs on American products.

"I got a call from Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi of India. They are one of the highest taxing nations in the world. They taxed us 100%," Trump said, reiterating his often-heard remarks on Indian tariff structure.

"They charge us 100% tariffs on goods. So they send a motorcycle — and they make a lot of them — Indian cycles. They send them to our country, we charge them nothing. We send a Harley Davidson to India and they charge us 100%. Not fair, okay. Not reciprocal. It's not fair," Trump said.

Explaining how his trade policies were successfully addressing the balance of trade issues with other countries, he said that trade talks with China were going on extremely well.

Since Trump imposed heavy tariffs on imported steel and aluminium items from China in March last year, the world’s two largest economies are locked in a trade war ever since. Trump’s move also sparked fears of a global trade war.

Trump said that top trade officials from America and China were in talks of negotiating an all-inclusive trade deal.

"I think we're doing very well. They need the deal more than we do. They need the deal. And they getting hurt badly with they're paying 25% on $50 billion worth of technical stuff and they were going to pay 25% on another $200 billion."

(With PTI inputs)

Updated 23:15 IST, April 4th 2019

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