Kuala Lampur: India and the Association of South East Asian Nations aim to forge a free-trade agreement by the start of 2007, both sides said after a meeting on Friday.
But ASEAN-member Malaysia said talks, due to be completed this June, could be tough after New Delhi wanted a host of items ? from toilet seats to crabs and chewing gum ? excluded from tariff cuts.
"India has put forward 1,414 items on the exclusion list which we cannot accept," Malaysian Trade Minister Rafidah Aziz told reporters.
"They represent 44 percent of ASEAN-India trade."
She said key items on the tentative Indian list included rice, textiles, palm oil, coconut oil and petroleum products.
Vegetable oils and petroleum alone formed 77 per cent of ASEAN's exports to India, she said.
"These are straightaway excluded, so then what is left?" she asked. "India should do a lot of chopping off."
Malaysia is the world's top palm oil producer and exporter.
Still, Friday's agreement on a 2007 deadline would accelerate work towards an India-ASEAN free-trade deal and would skip the usual incremental approach taken with ASEAN trade arrangements.
"The agreement will be effective from January 1, 2007," Trade Minister Kamal Nath said after talks in the Malaysian capital. "We should go straight to the full FTA and that's what we are doing."
He voiced confidence that outstanding issues would be settled shortly, with another round of talks to be held in February.
In 2004, two-way trade between ASEAN and India amounted to about $17.6 billion, with the balance in favour of ASEAN exports, according to Malaysian figures. India accounted for just 1.8 per cent of ASEAN's total global trade.
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