Indicating this, commerce and industry minister Murasoli Maran also told theRajya Sabha on Thursday that besides raising tariffs, the government couldtake other measures such as anti-dumping and countervailing duties andsafeguard actions under the WTO agreement.

He was replying to a calling attention notice regarding the adverse effectsof liberalisation of trade and free import of items manufactured by Indianindustry especially those in the SSI sector.

In a statement, the minister also said that the government had decided toamend the provisions of the Foreign Trade (Development and Regulation) Act,1992 so that safeguard action in the form of QRs could also be applied, ifthe situation warranted.

The imports were being closely monitored and the government was determinedto ensure through the appropriate use of the above mechanisms that importsdid not cause any serious injury to the domestic producers, the statementsaid.

He said a perusal of the import data revealed that there had not been anysurge of imports following the removal of QRs. "In fact, the rate of growthimports which stood at 35.40 per cent in 1995-96 has come down progressivelyover the years to 13.2 per cent in 1996-97, 11 per cent in 1997-98 and 14.2per cent in 1998-99", he added.

The government had lifted QRs earlier as well. At the time of initialannouncement of tariff line-wise import policy on April 1, 1996, out of10,202 tariff lines, 6,161 lines were already free. Thereafter during1996-97 and 1997-98 and 1998-99, QRs were removed on 488, 391 and 894 tarifflines respectively.

It was, therefore, evident that over the years QRs had been removedprogressively in line with India's international commitments and the policyof economic liberalisation. This had primarily been possible due toimprovements in the balance of payments position since 1991. QRs in respectof all tariff lines, barring a few items which were canalised, had beenwithdrawn for imports from SAARC countries from August 1, 1998.

As per the bilateral agreement with the US, QRs on the remaining 715 tarifflines were to be removed by April 1, 2001. The agreement followed therejection of India's appeal before the WTO Appellate Body which had acceptedthe findings of a WTO panel that India had no justitication in maintainingQRs for balance of payments reasons.