US envoy says trade deal breakthrough in sight

India saw the driest June in more than a decade with monsoon rainfall  nearly 40% below the long-term average, weather data showed on Tuesday. That is also the fifth driest June since 1901. 

The data showed India received 99.5 mm of rainfall in ​June against a normal of 165.3 mm.

This was largely due to the delayed advance of the annual monsoon winds, critical for the country’s agriculture. As a result, planting of summer crops such as rice, corn, cotton and soybeans has been delayed too.

Earlier this year, the India Meteorological Department said it expected lower-than-normal monsoons as forecasters predicted a strong El Nino. Meanwhile, the northern plains of India are facing extreme heat with maximum temperatures of about 42 degrees Celsius in several regions.

Miles from the coast, families in Kerala wake up to seawater indoors. Local women have uncovered and mapped a hidden crisis, forcing authorities to respond. 

The Special Intensive Revisions (SIR) of electoral rolls began in Delhi on Tuesday, with more than 13,000 ground-level officers beginning the month-long exercise. This will ultimately determine if a person can vote and avail of benefit schemes in the national capital. 

Booth-level officers have been instructed to deliver enumeration forms to voters door-to-door in early mornings and evenings, when people are likely to be at home. The exercise is expected to conclude on July 29, and the new draft electoral roll will be published on August 5, according to the Delhi office of the Chief Electoral Officer.

A sweeping voter registration overhaul, SIR is meant to remove ineligible voters, but critics say it is skewed against marginalized and minority communities. It kicked off last year in several states and territories, including West Bengal, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party recently won state elections.

Several Indian media outlets have reported on how citizens living in India for decades were removed from the voter list due to technical issues or lack of complete documentation. In India, if a person’s name is struck off the voters’ list, they are also rendered ineligible for subsidized food schemes.

The first phase of a landmark India-US trade deal is in its “final steps” with only “the last 1%” of the deal remaining, Sergio Gor, the US ambassador to India, said on Tuesday, according to Indian news agency PTI. 

Gor expressed confidence that the deal would soon be concluded, adding that he is “determined to bring this to a close.”

Both India and the US have made similar comments in the last two months. In early June, India’s Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal had also claimed that 99% of the trade deal negotiations were complete.

Since then, a US trade delegation and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer have visited India separately, with no major breakthroughs announced. 

US President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi first announced negotiations for the US-India Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA) in February 2025.

However, strained ties and global conflicts have delayed negotiations, with the talks only restoring momentum this year.

For months, India and the United States have insisted that a trade deal is just around the corner. Yet every round of talks seems to end with the same message: substantial progress, but no breakthrough.

The reasons lie in familiar fault lines in global trade — market access, tariffs, and a negotiation where neither side can afford to appear to have blinked first.

Nearly 18 months into talks, experts told DW that they believe Indian Trade Minister Piyush Goyal when he says a deal is “very close.” But the deal is unlikely to go through until both sides get a few critical assurances.

Read the full story here.

Pakistan’s Government is holding a seminar on the Indus Water Treatyon Tuesday in Islamabad to dicuss its rights amid India’s continued abeyance of the deal.

“Water and legal experts from around the world will be attending the seminar,” Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar was quoted as saying by Pakistani newspaper Dawn. 

“Legally, Pakistan’s stance has garnered support internationally, as the IWT cannot be unilaterally revoked, abolished or amended,” Tarar said. “There is a tap being controlled by the prime minister of a neighboring country. He says he will not let even a drop of water flow into Pakistan,” he added. 

A video of Pakistan’s Climate Change Minister, who was also at the conference, has gone viral on social media. “It has already been declared that whoever touches our water, their hands would be cut off,” several Indian news outlets, including the Times of India, quoted Musadik Malik saying.

The comments came weeks after India’s Water Minister, in an interview to news channel NDTV, said not a single drop of water meant for India would flow to Pakistan.

Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Ajay Rai alleged that he was held by police authorities at his hotel in the northern city of Ayodhya, just as he arrived with a party delegation on Monday to visit the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir amid an ongoing graft row. 

“I had just arrived in Ayodhya when the BJP government got so scared that the police arrested me from the hotel and are taking me away in their jeep,” Rai said in the post.

The government has yet to comment on the issue.

Rai and a larger Congress party delegation are scheduled to visit the Ram Mandir on Tuesday, amid a growing controversy over alleged donation theft by the temple’s trustees. Read our full story on Rai’s visit to Ayodhya here.

Hello and welcome to DW’s India news blog!

This is Mahima Kapoor reporting from the New Delhi Bureau, bringing to you the biggest headlines and talking points of the day. 

A Congress party leader from the northern state of Uttar Pradesh has claimed that he was detained by authorities at a hotel after arriving in the holy city of Ayodhya with a delegation to visit the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir. The sprawling temple — a shining beacon for India’s ruling Hindu nationalist party, Bharatiya Janata Party — is currently at the center of a controversy.  The temple’s trust is facing an investigation into allegations of embezzlement of donation funds. 

In West Bengal, a massive blaze at an industrial complex has left several people injured, many in critical condition. The incident has reportedly disrupted train services in the region. 

On the international front, the US Ambassador to India has said a trade agreement between New Delhi and Washington is in its “final steps.” That’s only the first phase of a landmark bilateral trade agreement that has been in the works since early 2025.

Stay tuned for all of this and more.