On August 7, 2026, Department of Economic Affairs Secretary Anuradha Thakur said that the overhaul of India’s 2016 Model Bilateral Investment Treaty is in its final stages and will soon be placed before the Union Cabinet. First announced in the 2025-26 Union Budget, the revision aims to make India’s treaty regime more investor-friendly while retaining sovereign safeguards, and is expected to unlock stalled BIT negotiations with partners including the United Kingdom and the European Union. No draft text has been made public, although recent treaties such as the India-UAE BIT signal the likely direction, including a shortened local remedies requirement. The 2016 Model anchored India’s retrenchment after it terminated some 75 BITs; its recalibration would mark the most significant repositioning by a major developing economy in a decade, and governments across the Global South will read it as a test of whether investor-friendliness and regulatory autonomy can be reconciled in treaty text. For earlier coverage, see ITN’s report on the announced revision.