New York:
India has softened its stance against the US on the solar energy dispute, opting for talks instead of filing lawsuits against it at the world's highest trade authority, the World Trade Organization (WTO), but maintains that it has a 'stronger legal position'.
Speaking to NDTV in New York, Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change, Prakash Javadekar said, "Even though India's legal position is stronger, we always want to solve issues through discussions."
Mr Javadekar and Minister for Power, Coal and Renewable Energy, Piyush Goyal, met US Secretary of State John Kerry on the sidelines of the Climate Change Agreement at the United Nations on April 22, and said they "discussed all climate change issues including WTO disputes." India has raised the issues and concerns at "the right place", Mr. Javadekar said, and added that "when the world is challenged by climate change, you have to be more generous with each other and the US must have an accommodative spirit."
In recent days India had accused the US of double standards in solar trade. In February the WTO ruled in favor of the US against India, holding India accountable for protecting its domestic solar energy players. In an earlier interview, Mr. Goyal told NDTV that India has strong evidence that the US is using those same laws of domestic protection in 16 of its own states.
A World Trade Organization panel ruled in February in favour of a US claim that India's rules restricting what products can be used in its solar industry breach international trade regulations. WTO's dispute settlement board ruled that India's requirement that only Indian-made products be used in large parts of its rapidly expanding solar power industry were "inconsistent" with a range of global trade regulations.