The almost certain appointment of Yuri Dmitriyevich Maslyukov as the first deputy prime minister in charge of economy and industries would complement Yevgeny Primakov's political ideology of restoring the great Russian state and returning to the third world markets, traditional buyers of Soviet machinery and technology.

Maslyukov was Soviet deputy premier and planning commission chief under former president Mikhail Gorbachev.

While developing its economic trade and technological ties with third world giants like India, Moscow can revive its heavy industries traditionally exporting their produce to the power generation, metallurgy, mining and infrastructure sectors in the developing countries in exchange for their traditional exports to the Russian market,observers say.

Today, imports of most of the traditional commodities of the developing nations are controlled by western companies.

Multinationals like Unilever have up to 40 per cent share in the packed tea market in Russia, selling their blends under brand names which have nothing to do with the traditional taste of Indian tea the Russians are used to.

Regional leaders like Moscow mayor Luzhkov have been unsuccessfully trying to persuade the federal government to allocate rupee funds accumulated through debt repayment by India to them for direct trade and investment.

With the installation of the Primakov cabinet, this problem could be resolved, a spokesman for Moscow mayor said.

Luzhkov is scheduled to leave for India on September 23 to inaugurate the Moscow cultural festival in Delhi.

According to sources close to Luzhkov, he intends to buy food products in India worth 300 million US dollars during his visit.

He hopes that Primakov would revert the decision taken by Anatoly Chubas, underpremier Chernomyrdin, to demand hard cash from India instead of annual installments of Rs 3,000 crore for the purchase of Indian commodities.

However, it is still too early to say what would be the first steps of the Left-Centrist Primakov government in the present crisis situation.

According to observers, one thing is certain. That is Russia is bidding farewell to the monetarist policy imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and would concentrate on developing its own resources.