Subject Group on Administrative And Legal Simplifications

Report on
Implementable Action Plans in the area of
Administrative and Legal Simplifications.

The Task Force recognises that India will be increasingly under compulsion to follow the policies adopted by the developed nations, in particular the G15 countries, and it cannot afford to isolate itself from the global community. Integrating the national economy with the global economy is a necessary concomitant to liberalisation and Indian industry will have to go through a phase of readjustment and reorientation.

As a part of globalisation, India has been participating in various negotiations culminating in diverse agreement and treaties. The Task Force would like to emphasise the need to see these treaties and agreements as not merely a political process, but as a process which is closely associated with Indian industry.

During the course of its dialouge with the Disinvestment Commission, the Task Force had the opportunity to understand the effect of various WTO agreements, which have been signed by India. It appeared that there was no structured approach or organised arrangement to involve all the interested parties to evaluate the effect of an agreement prior to its signature and also to examine the fall out of such WTO agreements.

The Disinvestment Commission was of the view that a Department of International Trade and Co-operation could be set-up under the Commerce Ministry which would address all the concerns. This Department can have a wide representation and can be supported by a panel of legal experts to examine and understand the effect of WTO agreements and the impact of the decisions given by the Dispute Settlement Body of the WTO.

Since most WTO agreements would be coming up for discussion by end 1999, it was considered appropriate that the opportunity be seized to review those agreements to ensure that the concerns that India and Indian industry has on some of the critical issues, are adequately debated and defended.

The Task Force would not like to sound ominous, but would only stress on the need to monitor the WTO agreements in a careful manner as otherwise some of those agreements can be pressed into service to suit the interests of the developed countries. This could drastically alter the position of Indian industry in the global scenario.

The Task Force therefore suggests that the Ministry of Commerce should explore the need to set-up a separate department with the sole purpose of examining various WTO agreements and to ensure that the interest of Indian industry is not in anyway compromised.