India's Model Bilateral Investment Treaty, 2016
A Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT) is a treaty specifically protecting cross-border investments (distinct from a trade agreement, which covers goods/services trade). India revised its BIT template in 2016 after a wave of investor-state arbitration claims against it, adopting a more state-protective model that most new BITs, including any with Australia, would need to be negotiated against.
- India's 2016 Model BIT requires foreign investors to exhaust local (domestic) legal remedies for five years before invoking international investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) arbitration
- It excludes taxation, government procurement, subsidies, compulsory licensing and national security matters from BIT protection, preserving domestic regulatory space
- It omits a Most Favoured Nation (MFN) investment protection clause, limiting investors' ability to import more favourable provisions from India's other treaties
- India terminated most of its older-generation BITs (over 50) around 2016-17 after adverse arbitration awards (e.g., White Industries v. India, 2011) and has been renegotiating fresh treaties on the new template since
● Tracked since August 07, 2026 · last seen September 25, 2026 · updates as the daily brief publishes
See it in today’s brief.
Daily current affairs with every static concept explained in place.
Read the daily brief