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‘Orders placed on Boeing and yet to be placed but ready, are $70-80 billion. If you add the engines and other spare parts, it will probably cost $100 billion,’ says Piyush Goyal.
Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal. (File Photo: PTI)
The government is ready to place aircraft orders worth as much as $80 billion with Boeing, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has said, adding that the order cost reaches around $100 billion if engines and other spare parts are added.
Speaking with reporters on February 5, on India’s aircraft demand, Goyal said, “Orders placed on Boeing and yet to be placed but ready, are nearly $70-80 billion. If you add the engines and other spare parts, it will probably cost $100 billion.”
He added that for data centres, huge concessions have been announced in the Budget.
The comments come even as Boeing faces litigation linked to last year’s Air India plane crash in Ahmedabad. Families of passengers who died in the June disaster have filed lawsuits against Boeing, alleging defective dual switches played a role in the accident that killed 241 of the 242 people on board, according to the minister.
Goyal also pointed to a broader opportunity to procure at least $500 billion worth of US goods over the next five years, while clarifying that no explicit investment commitment was made under the trade understanding with Washington.
Earlier this week, within days of the India-EU trade deal, US President Donald Trump announced on social media that New Delhi and Washington had reached a trade agreement. Trump said the US would cut tariffs on Indian goods to 18%, while India would reduce duties on US products to zero, replace Russian oil with supplies from the US and Venezuela, open sensitive sectors such as agriculture, and buy $500 billion of American goods.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi welcomed the tariff cuts.
India and the US are expected to issue a joint statement in a few days to finalise the first tranche of the deal, Goyal said. The 18% tariff on Indian exports to the US would take effect after the statement is released. A formal agreement is slated for mid-March, after which tariff concessions for US goods entering India would kick in.
According to sources, staples such as rice, wheat, soyabean, corn, dairy products and sugar are completely outside the ambit of the India-US trade agreement, addressing concerns around food security and farmer interests.
Officials stressed that the bulk of what Indian farmers produce will not be impacted, as agricultural imports from the United States will largely be limited to items that are not produced at scale in India. These imports, sources said, will not include mass-consumption commodities that could disrupt domestic markets.
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February 06, 2026, 13:18 IST
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