As India and Canada hold the 6th round of trade negotiations this week, Canada’s high commissioner to India Christopher Cooter has said Ottawa is confident of finalising the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) ahead of PM Narendra Modi’s visit to Canada next month.While the agreement will still have to be ratified, the announcement about successful conclusion of the negotiations during Modi’s Dec 11-12 visit will mark a milestone in the relationship, capping the dramatic turnaround in India-Canada ties under Canadian PM Mark Carney and Modi in the past 18 months.“The actual ratification would take some time because we have provincial governments that are involved as well. But I think we can be pretty confident that the final text will be there,” said Cooter in an interaction with TOI editors.“We’re hopeful about our ratification process. The 6th round of talks is coming up. I’m pretty confident that we’re getting close, so we’ll keep our fingers crossed. We’re also looking at some subsidiary agreements that would facilitate business travel,” added Cooter. He also said many other big-ticket announcements were expected from the visit including in space. Cooter also addressed public anxiety over international student policies of Canada, home to roughly 300,000 Indian students. He clarified that official caps were targeted at fraudulent institutions rather than legitimate Indian applicants.“People said, ‘Oh my God, Canada’s not open’. This was a misperception. In fact, the caps are nowhere near being met. This is probably the best time ever, if you’re a prospective Indian student. Of course there were some abuses. There were these fly-by-night colleges. They weren’t about education as much as getting PR. So, we’ve got to clean that up,” said Cooter.Cooter also said the progress witnessed in the ties since Carney assumed office had moved “far beyond a reset”. He said the recovery was initially fragile, but gained unprecedented momentum following bilateral engagements between the leaders.
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“It’s not a reset. It is far beyond a reset. When I arrived here in Sept last year, it was a tentative approach. None of us knew what was going to happen next. Is this going to be a slow march? Are we going to take a step back? Very fragile at the beginning. But it didn’t happen that way. When foreign minister Anita Anand was here last month, we called on your PM and he described it as the fastest acceleration in the relationship,” said Cooter.