Renegotiating India’s Investment Agreements: A Policy Perspective

By Prabhash Ranjan | Briefing Paper # 7 | August 2012

There has been an exponential growth in International Investment Agreements (IIAs), signed by countries to protect foreign investments, in the last two decades. IIAs are treaties signed at the bilateral, regional or multilateral level by two or more countries to protect investments made by investors of respective countries. IIAs protect investments by imposing conditions on the regulatory behaviour of the host state.

This briefing paper examines the broad substantive provisions of Indian IIAs and suggests how these broad provisions can be narrowed so as to allow India exercise its regulatory space freely. The paper calls for renegotiating some of the provisions and provide concrete policy suggestions regarding the content of these substantive treaty protections.