Clifford Chance

India's foreign investment strategy: Latest Developments

16 July 2025

India recently entered into three Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs), with Kyrgyzstan (on 5 June 2025), Uzbekistan (on 15 May 2025) and the United Arab Emirates (on 31 August 2024). These new treaties reflect India's broader foreign investment shift towards safeguarding sovereign rights while promoting economic growth.

Between 2016 and 2021, following several high-profile investment treaty claims against India, the country terminated its BITs with more than 70 countries and has since sought to negotiate new ones which align with its strategy based on a more state-centric approach.

The new BITs with Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and the UAE embody this approach, offering more limited protections to investors than previous treaties while ensuring the state's ability to regulate.

While each BIT has certain unique features, the overall provisions are broadly consistent, with the key takeaways being as follows.

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