London: Britain’s prime ministerial candidate, Jeremy Hunt has reiterating his plans to strengthen the bilateral ties and strike a post-Brexit Free Trade Agreement.
This is seen as his attempt to reach reached out to the Indian diaspora to boost his chances against Boris Johnson,
The 52-year-old UK foreign secretary, who is going head to head with former foreign secretary Johnson, wrote to the Conservative Friends of India (CFIN), saying he looks forward to engaging with India.
He reiterated his plans to further strengthen the “incredibly important” India-UK relationship and strike a post-Brexit Free Trade Agreement (FTA).
“I look forward to engaging with India to negotiate a free trade agreement following Britain’s exit from the European Union later this year,” Hunt said in a letter addressed to the CFIN membership.
“Given the closeness of our two countries, I hope and expect we will be able to agree this very soon,” he said.
CFIN, co-chaired by British-Indian businessman Rami Ranger and Conservative Party MP Zac Goldsmith, promotes closer ties between the ruling Conservative Party and India.
As it is made up of the Tory party membership base, CFIN members will be among the nearly 166,000 voters set to cast their postal ballot to elect a new party leader who will go on to become Britain’s Prime Minister on July 23.
“With 1,451,862 British people of Indian-origins living in the UK and close to 150,000 British people living in India, the ongoing relationship between our two countries is incredibly important,” notes Hunt, in the letter issued this week.
The senior Conservative Party leader hailed the “living bridge” of the Indian diaspora between India and the UK and pledged that as Prime Minister, he would look forward to working with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his new agenda, especially on areas such as building climate resilience and improving the ease of doing business.
“As Prime Minister, I would ensure that our relation hip continues to expand, as both countries work together for mutual benefit, creating prosperity, championing the rules-based international system and working together to address common threats and challenges.
“Both India and the UK have major roles to play in a safe and secure world, and our focus should be on the future, working to sustain and build a flourishing partnership,” he said.
