Creation of Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR) in Department of Commerce

The Government of India carried out an Amendment to the Government of India (Allocation of Business) Rules, 1961 on May 7, 2018 substituting “Directorate General of Trade Remedies” in place of “Directorate General of Anti-Dumping and Allied Duties” in Department of Commerce.  This has paved way for creation of an integrated single umbrella National Authority to be called the Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR) for providing comprehensive and swift trade defence mechanism in India. The amendment of Allocation of Business Rules has also mandated Department of Commerce with work pertaining to recommendation of Safeguard measures.

2.  Presently, the trade defence mechanism in India lacks optimality and takes more than a year to complete proceedings in cases pertaining to unfair trade practices.  Currently, the Directorate General of Anti-dumping and Allied Duties (DGAD) deals with anti-dumping and CVD cases, Directorate General of Safeguards (DGS) deals with safeguard measures and DGFT deals with quantitative restriction (QR) safeguards.  The DGTR will bring DGAD, DGS and Safeguards (QR) functions of DGFT into its fold by merging them into one single national entity. DGTR will deal with Anti-dumping, CVD and Safeguard measures. It will also provide trade defence support to our domestic industry and exporters in dealing with increasing instances of trade remedy investigations instituted against them by other countries.  The creation of DGTR will provide a level playing field to the domestic industry.  In the last three years, India initiated more than 130 anti-dumping/countervailing duty/safeguard cases to deal with the rising incidences of unfair trade practices and to provide a level playing field to the domestic industry.

3.   The DGTR will function as an attached office of Department of Commerce.  The recommendation of DGTR for imposition of Anti-dumping, countervailing & Safeguard duties would be considered by the Department of Revenue.

4.   The DGTR will be a professionally integrated organisation with multi-spectrum skill sets emanating from officers drawn from different services and specialisations.  The DGTR will also bring in substantial reduction of the time taken to provide relief to the domestic industry.  The newly constituted body is in consonance with the goal of Minimum Government Maximum Governance of the Prime Minister of India.

5.   The Commerce and Industry Minister Sh. Suresh Prabhu expressed his satisfaction over the fact that the proposal of creation of DGTR which was pending since 1997 has been approved under the leadership of the Prime Minister, making it an epochal event for the benefit of the domestic industry.