Union Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Thursday said the first tranche of the proposed India-US trade agreement had been finalised and was currently undergoing legal drafting, with both sides hoping to operationalise it once India secured a competitive edge over peer nations.Goyal said the agreement was in its final stages. “The US bilateral trade agreement’s first tranche has been finalised. It is going through the final contours and legal drafting, and we hope to finalise that soon and operationalise it once we get comparable or competitive advantage over our peer countries,” he said.Goyal maintained that his position on the negotiations had remained unchanged. “What I have said today is exactly what I said yesterday, a week ago and three months ago,” he remarked.His comments come amid prolonged negotiations between India and the US over the trade pact. A framework for a temporary trade agreement was announced in February, but shifting tariff policies in the US have delayed its finalisation. India has been seeking preferential market access and tariff treatment better than that available to competing countries.Commerce Secretary Rajesh Agrawal later said negotiations were moving in the “right direction” and that both sides were working towards concluding the deal at the earliest. However, he indicated that signing would depend on the US completing work on its broader tariff framework.Earlier this month, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer had said both countries had identified the key sticking points but that an agreement was “not imminent”.Goyal also said the proposed India-EU free trade agreement was expected to be signed in December and could come into effect in February or March next year.