From: reddym@Barra.COM (Reddy Mallidi)
Subject: India's foreign trade deficit goes up
Organization: BARRA, CA
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 93 13:50:25 GMT


     Source : XINHUA, TASS, IPS
     Dates  : Jan 13-20, 1993
     Country: India

                                * * * *

    * Military Industrial technology put into civil use

    New Delhi 01/15 : India's Defense Research and Development Organization
    (DRDO) entered into a joint venture for the first time to exploit 
    advanced military technologies for civilian application, a defence
    ministry press release said here today. A MOU signed here between the 
    DRDO and the Calcutta-based Carbon Composites India Ltd. envisaged
    formation of a joint venture for the management, orgnization, and 
    marketing of products of the organization's composite products center
    as a viable commercial enterprise. The civilian areas to be targeted 
    by the venture will include space, communication, non-conventional
    energy resources, aircraft components and medical rehabilitation. (XIN)

    * India's foreign trade deficit goes up

    New Delhi 01/13 : India's foreign trade deficit soared to a record
    high of $3,400m during the first 8 months of 1992-1993 (April-Nov)
    fiscal year. Figures from the commerce ministry showed that trade
    deficit doubled as compared to $1.3b in the same period of 1991-92. 
    The country's aggregate exports in U.S. dollars during April-Nov 1992-93
    were estimated at $11.594b, against imports at $14.691b. However,
    compared to the exports of $10.950b in the first eight months of 1991-92
    the exports in dollar terms grew by 5.9% in the same period in 1992-93.
    In April-Nov 1992-93, exports to general currency area were estimated
    at $11.159b, as against $9.842b in the corresponding period of 1991-92,
    showing a positive growth of 13.38%. (XIN)

    * India and Chile sign cultural agreement

    New Delhi 01/13 : India and Chile signed a cultural agreement here
    today. The agreement was signed by joint secretary in the Indian
    department of culture Komal Anand and Chilian ambassador to India
    Eduardo Ortiz. The agreement covers the fields of culture, education,
    mass media and sports. (XIN)

    * Shumeiko in India to prepare Yeltsin's visit

    New Delhi 01/19 : First Russain vice-premier Vladimir Shuneiko
    arrived here today to hold final round of negotiations on the eve of
    an official Indian visit of Russian president Boris Yeltsin scheduled
    for Jan 27-29. Shumeiko told TASS at the airport that he aims to 
    prepare a basis for holding the Russian state head's visit "with the
    maximus use". He will hold talks with Indian finance minister, 
    Manmohan Singh, ministers of foreign affairs, trade, defence and 
    heads of other departments. He is also expected to meet prime minister
    Rao. In the words of Shumeiko, over the past year and a half Russia
    has "somehow lost" in India the positions, which were characterstic
    of the Soviet-Indian relations. "We should upgrade relations with
    India to the previous level, but on a new basis", he said. (TASS)

    Jan 01/20 : Co-chairman of the joint intergovernmental commission for 
    trade and economic cooperation, and vice-primier Shuemiko and Indian    
    finance minister Manmohan Singh and members of the delegations of both
    countries are taking part in negotiations. The talks focussed on the
    correlation between the rouble and the rupee used by India in the 
    repayment of credits granted to it by the former Soviet Union. During
    the talks Shumeiko pointed out that Russia was attaching great
    importance to economic cooperation with india and expressed the hope
    for its dynamic and fruitful development. Later in the day Shumeiko
    met with Indian defence minister Sharad Pawar. (TASS)

    * India interested in Russian oil
    
    New Delhi 01/20 : India would like to keep receiving Russian oil and
    defence industry products and has a lot to offer in exchange, Indian
    foreign minister Dinesh Singh told reporters on Wednesday dwelling on
    the upcoming visit of the Russian president to India. (TASS)

    * Reforms to continue - Pranab Mukherji

    India's new commerce minister Pranab Mukherji, who sworn in two days
    back, underlined the continuation of economic reform programs. 
    Inaugurating a national seminar today on administrative reforms, he
    said that there should not be any apprehension regarding the stability
    and continuation of economic reforms programs. The minister assured that
    the crisis in Indian economic front would be resolved as the nation's
    resilience, various structures and institutions would enable the country
    to overcome it as in the past. He said it takes some time before the
    results of economic reforms would be felt, adding that some results have
    started coming in - as one can see that inflation rate has come down
    to around 7%. The growth of the Indian industry and economy as whole
    would be as anticipated despite some setback due to recent disturbances
    in some parts of the country. He also stressed the need for siplifying
    the customs and excise procedures at the seminar. (XIN)

    * AIDS virus spreading fast in India

    New Delhi 01/20 : Last month, the Indian Council of Medical Research
    (ICMR) acknowledged that 150,000 of India's estimated one million
    prostitutes may be HIV-infected. In a report, the ICMR has for the 
    first time given an assessment of the HIV epidemic in India, pegging
    the number of carriers at 637,000 in the country's urban areas. The
    report does not make any projections for rural India. It says there
    is no information about the sexual habits of the 95-million sexually
    active Indians who live in villages. Ofiicially only 10,856 Indian are
    HIV-infected. However, critics say the figures do not reflect the
    reality. Top Indian virologist Dr. Jacob John believes some 2.5 million
    may be HIV-infected, whild India's AIDS control chief P.R. Dasgupta
    thinks that the epidemic has reached a stage where every Indian is at
    risk if he or she is not careful. "The chief co-factor is unprotected
    sex in Indian brothels. Prostitutes and their clients are infecting
    and getting infected by one another, and the clients are infecting
    wives who give birth to infected babys", says Dr. I.S.Gilada, head of
    Bombay base India Health Organization. Heterosexual transmission acounts
    for 80% of the cases. Bombay has an estimated 100,000 prostitutes and
    HIV-incidence has jumped from 2% to 4% in just three years. To complicate
    matters, Gilada estimates that 80% of women prostitutes are suffering
    from sexually transmitted deseases (STDs)  at any time.
    Besides heterosexual transmission, one hazard in India is its infected
    blood supply. The blood is not safe, because as much as 30% of it is
    from professional donors - malnourished and sometimes homeless, who sell    
    their blood for money. Many of the donors are infected, but continue to
    donate blood because no machinery exists to stop them from doing so.
    Dr. M.L. Gupta, director of Indian Red Cross says "the horrifying truth
    is that mos of India's blood banks don't have diagnostic kits to screen
    blood". (IPS)

Date: Wed, 20 Jan 93 16:03:06 PST
From: Ajai Banarji <banarji@unixg.ubc.ca>

	From CGI, Vancouver (Jan 19)

(Although the list of new cabinet members has been posted earlier, the
list of ministers dropped does not seem to have appeared yet.)

  A total of 14 ministers were dropped. One was a cabinet minister
(M.L. Fotedar). The Ministers of State and Deputy Ministers dropped
include:
Ashok Gehlot
M.M. Jacob
P.J Kurian
Mamta Banerji
Girija Vyas

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Newsgroups: misc.news.southasia