Foreign trade is not a theory.

Indians are very happy that the European Union has banned Indian mangoes from 1 May because of fears about pests. The result will be a flood of mangoes in local markets, bringing down prices, and the growers of mangoes will suffer heavy losses. The US is threatening to label India as Priority Foreign Country along with Ukraine. Mind you Canada, Finland and Israel are on their Priority Watch List along with many other countries but for India there seems to be a special hostility. The FDA in the US cancelled imports from a factory owned by Sun Pharma in Gujarat. Earlier they did the same to Ranbaxy and Wockhardt. The FAA in the US downgraded India's air safety rating to category 2, equivalent with Bangladesh and Swaziland. This may reduce the number of people flying in our airlines and increase costs.There seems to be a coordinated effort by the US and Europe to hurt Indian businesses. Why? Is it because India did not pull out of the Siachen Glacier as demanded by the US? Was the Prime Minister promised a Nobel Peace Prize and a roving ambassador role, as Tony Blair has been given, in return for the betrayal? For some utterly stupid and incomprehensible reason the US wants India to surrender to Pakistan when it was the intelligence agency of Pakistan, the ISI which organised and financed the 9/11 attacks. And we tried, by God. Just 6 months after the Mumbai attacks of 2008 we went on bended knees to Sharm al Sheikh to give a diplomatic victory to Pakistan. Luckily for us Saeed Hafiz and his Lashkar-e-Taiba / Jamaat-ud-Dawa came to our rescue time and again by carrying out one atrocity or another, resulting in such rage that the government was stopped in its tracks every time. When exports fall the trade deficit rises. The trade deficit in March was $10.5 billion because exports fell by 3.14%, but imports also fell by 2.1%. The fall in imports was mainly due to a steep fall in imports of gold and silver because of the restrictions placed on them by the government but smuggling has increased which is not reflected in the figures. While restricting the import of precious metals the Congress encouraged imports of everything else by not spending on manufacturing, mining and exploration for oil and gas. To get rural votes the Congress subsidised imported fertiliser and paid a Minimum Support Price for grains which resulted in double digit inflation in food by underpinning a high price. The only way to neutralise a hostile Obama administration is to get US businesses on our side by increasing trade. If you become rich you become powerful. It is automatic.