Gold imports fall 16% in October

Mumbai: India’s gold imports dipped by 16 per cent in value terms to $2.94 billion in October from $3.5 billion in the corresponding period last year, said the commerce ministry while releasing overall trade data for October. The reason for the decline, according to gold trade officials, was that Dusshera and poojas associated with it fell in September this year while Diwali fell in October.

Against this, all the festivals were concentrated in October of last year, said jewellers.



“The main reason for the decline in gold imports is that while last year Dusshera and Diwali were in the same month, this time around they were split between the two months of September and October,” said Sandeep Kulhalli, senior vicepresident, retail and marketing, Tanishq.

However, commerce ministry data showed that gems and jewellery exports fell around 25 per cent to $3.3 billion in October from the same time last year. The reasons for the decline, said Pravin Shankar Pandya, chairman, Gems and Jewellery Export Promotion Council, were three-fold — slowdown in international demand, Dubai’s imposition of 5 per cent import duty on gold jewellery imports and teething troubles associated with GST on movement of rough diamonds in manufacturing hubs. GST “issue” was being sorted out by government, said Pandya. Even on export of goods GST has to be paid on labour, etc, in the intra-manufacturing cycle for polished diamonds.