Prime Minister: A. B. Vajpayee
The gold airlift, liberalisation, and a floating rupee.
Bank Rate
6.5%
−1.5 pts on 2000
Rupee per dollar
₹47.22
+4.9% on 2000
Inflation
3.78%
−0.23 pts on 2000
GDP growth
4.82%
+0.98 pts on 2000
Reserves
$49,051m
+19.5% on 2000
External debt
$99,500m
−1.6% on 2000
Indian mutual-fund and retail-savings market · 2 July 2001
?, loss amount not found by me
Rajya Sabha held dedicated debates 2001-07-24, 07-31, 08-01 and 08-02
ReportedOfficial record. Source: Rajya Sabha items 19842 / 22405 / 21902 / 21912 (item pages opened)
Equities / insurance · 11 September 2001
Sensex fell sharply in the following week (exact % ?, not verified)
London war/terrorism cover repriced globally; Pakistan added to JWC listed areas (see [M9])
UnconfirmedOfficial record. Source: BSE historical data
Global equities, dollar funding, Indian software exports · 11 September 2001
Channel to India: FII outflows, slowdown in US IT spending hitting Indian software exports, and a stronger dollar
UnconfirmedOfficial record. Source: Not sourced in this session
India–Pakistan security; Indian equities · 13 December 2001
Preceded Operation Parakram (December 2001 – October 2002)
UnconfirmedOfficial record. Source: Not sourced in this session
quantitative restrictions
All remaining import restrictions maintained for balance-of-payments reasons were removed (WTO records this as "a major development since the previous Review"). Customs tariff thereby became the main form of border protection. Date of full removal is usually given as 1 April 2001; the WTO document confirms the fact, not the date, so the date is marked ?
VerifiedOfficial record. Source: WTO, Trade Policy Review of India, press release PRESS/TPRB/195, 2002-06-21 (wto.org)
applied MFN tariff
VerifiedOfficial record. Source: WTO, TPR India 2002, PRESS/TPRB/195
anti-dumping
WTO Secretariat records some 250 anti-dumping cases initiated by India since 1995, the fastest-growing protective instrument as tariffs fell
VerifiedOfficial record. Source: WTO, TPR India 2002, PRESS/TPRB/195
investment regime
WTO Secretariat: FDI accounted for some 1% of GDP, described as a disappointing record despite liberalisation of the FDI regime
VerifiedOfficial record. Source: WTO, TPR India 2002, PRESS/TPRB/195
tariff bindings
Share of tariff lines bound rose from 67% to 72% since the previous Review; average final bound rate 50.6%, i.e. well above applied MFN, leaving headroom to raise applied rates on some agricultural products
VerifiedOfficial record. Source: WTO, TPR India 2002, PRESS/TPRB/195
Central / South Asia
India became a major regional donor (reported cumulative pledges ≈ US$2 bn by 2011, later ~3 bn). Pakistan put on the London Joint War Committee listed areas after 9/11
ReportedOfficial record. Source: MEA annual reports; Dawn (see [M9])
South Asia
Mobilisation cost ? (not found). London hull underwriters put an additional war-risk premium on west-coast ports (Mumbai, JNPT, Kandla, Pipavav) from June 2002 (see [M8])
ReportedState media. Source: Gulf News "Sea Views" column (see [M8]); MoD annual report 2002-03
Afghanistan
More than USD 2 bn in grants. Projects: Zaranj–Delaram highway (2009), linking to Iran's Chabahar route; Pul-e-Khumri transmission line; Parliament building in Kabul (construction from 2009, inaugurated 2015-12); Salma Dam (≈USD 265–290 mn, inaugurated 2016-06-04). India was the fifth-largest bilateral donor.
ReportedPress. Source: IndiaSpend; Business Standard 2016-06-04; The Wire
Afghanistan / South Asia
Oil-price channel, Pakistan's front-line role, security spillover into Kashmir; India's reconstruction assistance to Afghanistan later in the decade
UnconfirmedOfficial record. Source: Not sourced in this session
New Delhi, India
Trigger for Operation Parakram mobilisation
UnconfirmedOfficial record. Source: Not sourced in this session
India–Pakistan border, Punjab/Rajasthan/J&K
Cost of mobilisation, widely cited figures (tens of thousands of crores) could not be traced to a primary document in this session, so recorded as ?. What is documented is that it was sustained for ~10 months and involved the largest Indian Army deployment since 1971
UnconfirmedOfficial record. Source: Cost figure not found by me to a primary source; see Gaps
capital markets / banking (diversion of bank funds through the call-money and badla/NSE-BSE arbitrage channels)
SFIO report on the Ketan Parekh scam received by the Ministry of Corporate Affairs 2007-03-26 and forwarded to the Assessing Officer. Criminal and regulatory proceedings continued well past the decade
VerifiedOfficial record. Source: Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question 466, 2007-05-04, MoS Finance S.S. Palanimanickam, ; Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question 1519, 2010-11-18, Ministry of Corporate Affairs, https://archive.org/details/eparlib.nic.in.592421 (archive.org)
mutual funds / capital markets
Inspection found UTI held 57,195 / 52,795 / 72,150 / 106,350 / 376,138 / 480,236 Lupin Ltd shares on 1999-09-01, 1999-10-01, 1999-11-01, 1999-12-01, 2000-01-01 and 2000-02-01. UTI also held 4,770,199 shares of Global Telefilms, 40 lakh secured redeemable non-convertible debentures of Kopran Ltd, and 24,499,520 shares of Zee Telefilms. Penalties: dismissal from service for two officers and recovery of pecuniary loss against one officer (ATR laid December 2006). The questioner's assertion of Rs 180 crore of UTI losses in Lupin was put to the Minister and NOT confirmed or denied in the answer, it is an unverified parliamentary question, not a finding
VerifiedOfficial record. Source: Lok Sabha, Unstarred Question 1519, 2010-11-18, Minister of Corporate Affairs Salman Khurshid (archive.org)
all
ReportedState media. Source: [M9] Dawn (dawn.com)
