NEW DELHI: Government today promised all steps to protect domestic industry after concern was raised in the Lok Sabha over flooding of cheap Chinese goods in the market through third countries.
Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told Lok Sabha that government has taken various measures to check cheap imports and dumping.
Responding to queries on cheaper Chinese products coming into India from other countries, the Minister said many goods are coming through that way.
“This is a larger issue on which the Ministry is certainly working,” she said during Question Hour.
Noting that the government is seized of the matter, she said, “I would not say comprehensively work has been already done. We will certainly initiate every process which is required.
“I am certainly aware that not just in bicycles but in many other products too such a thing is happening. We are certainly working on understanding how best we can countervail these sort of things,” she said.
Responding to a query on Chinese bicycles being imported into India, she said such imports are showing downward trend.
“The import of bicycles has gone down from Rs 265 crore in 2011-12 to Rs 68 crore in 2013-14, thereby registering a decline of 74 per cent in the last three years,” she said.
Meanwhile, the Directorate General of Anti-Dumping and Allied-Duties (DGAD) has initiated investigations into 690 cases as on August 6, 2014, “involving 302 products from various countries since 1992,” Sitharaman said.
“Out of these, 166 products involve imports from China.
The Chinese products in respect of which anti-dumping duty has been imposed, fall in the product groups of chemicals and petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, products of steel and other metals, fibers and yarns and consumer goods,” she said.
Among others, the government has prohibited import of milk and milk products – including chocolate and chocolate products and candies/confectionery/food preparations with milk or milk solids as an ingredient – from China since December 2008.
The prohibition is in place till June 23, 2015.
“India removed all quantitative restrictions on imports, except those necessitated mainly on grounds of health, security, public morale and environment in the year 2001.
“However, adequate provisions exist to protect the Indian consumers and producers,” Sitharaman said.
On counterfeit goods, she said primary responsibility of investigating the complaints of manufacturing and trading of such products rests with the concerned state police.
Information about influx of counterfeit goods is not available with the Ministry, Sitharaman noted.
“The difficulty in this is that, when counterfeit goods come into the country, only when the owner of the brand genuinely feels that his products are being imitated…it is raised as an issue and becomes a cause for investigation.
“We are in no position to identify how many such counterfeits are coming. So, the original brand holder is the one who should initiate the process,” the Minister said.
However, she assured the government would “try to see how best we can, if at all, initiate some process”.
Meanwhile, the Minister said that 107 products are currently covered under compulsory Bureau of Indian Standards certification and compulsory registration scheme.–PTI
