The Uruguay Round: It's Repercussion for India

Abstract

To ignite the world trade, a number of global economic institutions have been formed to carry out multilateral free trade in the world of multilingual and multi religious community. General Agreement on Tariff and Trade is one of them, which was signed on 30.10.1947. The fundamental aims of GATT were to liberalize world trade negotiations among member countries. Therefore, reduction of tariffs on trade on manufacturers was adopted as major goal of GATT. One of the major activities of the GATT since its inception has been launching of a series of rounds of negotiations. The first one was Geneva Round (Switzerland, 1947) & the last one is Uruguay round (Punta del Este, 1986). Almost in all the rounds some trade related barriers have been tried to remove for free trade among countries.India is one of the signatory of Uruguay Round (UR). The basic thrust of UR Final Act attack was that the Indian government has surrendered its sovereignty under pressure from the US government and the multinationals. There is no doubt that some of the criticisms were politically motivated and value loaded.Any comprehensive analysis of the implications of the Uruguay Round for India would have to cover all-important concerns. However the present study is an attempt to delineate only the major concerns regarding the implication of Uruguay Round agreement for India concerning to Reductions in tariff, Agreement on Anti-dumping, Agreement on TRIMS, Agreement on Agriculture Agreement on Services, Agreement on TRIPS, Agreement on Textile and Clothing, Social causes in GATT, Dispute settlement body. Finally an attempt has been made to suggest the future avenues for further productive dialogues in future ministerial councils.