The officials will also be carrying out a survey on the thinking of the American conglomerates in terms of mending ties between both the countries that recently got entangled in a bitter fight over IPR and compulsory licensing issues, especially in the pharmaceuticals sector.
Their findings here will also be used as a basis of the out-of-cycle reviews (OCRs) that US authorities intends carrying out from August onwards, as part of the suggestion made in the Special 301 Report of the US Trade Representative Office.
According to sources, USITC officials have met senior executives of Eli Lilly, Pfizer, Agilent, Abbott, Microsoft and Monsanto among other.
Although the Narendra Modi-led government is expected to revive the bilateral ties between both countries, it is unlikely that it will allow any sort of unilateral action by the US, sources said.
Minister of Commerce and Industry Nirmala Sitharaman had told this paper in an interview that efforts are on to negotiate with the US and make them understand the country's IPR regime. She also asserted that India is not in violation of the global trading rules.
Earlier this year, apprehensions were running high here that the US might tag India as 'Priority Foreign Country' in its annual Special 301 Report. This is a label given by the US government to those countries where, it believes, gross violation of IPR laws has taken place.
However, India was kept in the 'Priority Watch List' meaning US will keep a hawkish stance on India's IPR laws and will take action in the event India exercises any of its flexibilities under these laws.
"It is imperative that the industry and the governments of both the countries come together to discuss this issue in a reasoned and respectful manner. Do we have concerns regarding IPR in India? Yes. Going forward, is acrimony the answer? Absolutely not. It is time to open up the lines of communication and address the challenges directly," US India Business Council's Acting President Diane Farrell said recently.
The Obama administration had been miffed with India over a number of issues. Bilateral trade ties started getting impacted since 2011 when the US government raised the fees for professional visas - H1B and L1.
Since then, India and the US have dragged each other to the WTO's disputes settlement body on various issues. Significant among those were New Delhi banning the US's poultry imports and Washington levying extra duties on steel items from India.
Since US President Barack Obama's visit to India in 2010, American companies started becoming vocal about India's IPR laws and patents regime. This reached its peak in April last year, when the Supreme Court rejected a patent application made by Swiss company Novartis for its cancer drug, Glivec.
But matters went from bad to worse during the diplomatic row over Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade, who was arrested in the US and strip-searched over charges of visa fraud.
American companies have been raising questions on India's IPR laws since the controller general of patents, designs and trademarks decided to grant a compulsory licence to Natco Pharma to produce and sell generic versions of Bayer-Onyx's cancer drug, Nexavar.
All eyes are now on the upcoming India-US Trade Policy Forum meet that is expected to take place in July-end or early August. India and US have set a bilateral trade of $500 billion in goods and services from $100 billion currently.
