New Delhi, March 21: The commerce ministry is likely to shift a little over 50 per cent of the special import licence (SIL) items to the open general licence list when the revised export and import policy is notified on March 31. This means that the SIL route will remain open to select categories of exporters for import of the remaining items till March 31, 2001.A large number of restricted items are also expected to be transferred to the OGL list, making a total of 714 tariff lines at eight-digit level. This will mark the first phase of removal of quantitative restrictions on import of these items from April 1. QRs will continue to apply on some sensitive items till March 31 next year.
SIL is among the incentives available to select categories of exporters such as export, trading, star trading and super star trading houses. But with the premium which SIL has been commanding in the market dropping to just one per cent, the SIL instrument has lost all its shine.
The premium had been ranging between 3 to 5 per cent immediately after the announcement of the revised exim policy on March 31 last year. Another reason why SIL does not provide any attraction to these exporters is that they are not able to import gold and silver as before.
Of the 714 tariff lines, 685 lines are on SIL and the goods are allowed to be imported against surrender of three times the value of SIL to the licensing authorities.
The second phase due to start from April 1 next year, involves removal of quantitative restrictions on 715 tariff lines, bringing the total to 1429 lines. India had been maintaining QRs on imports, on balance of payment grounds, on 2,714 tariff lines as on March 31, 1997 against which the US had filed a dispute in the World Trade Oganisation (WTO). Of these, India had removed QRs on 1,285 lines, including 425 lines for agricultural items in the last three years, including the current one.
Copyright © 2000 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.