The government envisages a relook at gold imports after Diwali, says finance minister Arun Jaitley in the wake of spurt in shipment of the metal into the country, which in turn has led to the trade deficit reaching an 18-monh high. Jaitley said the government will take an appropriate decision after the festival season gets over whether to impose curbs in brining gold into the country. The government and the RBI had imposed restrictions on gold import after the current account deficit reached a record high of 4.8% of the GDP in 2012-13 mainly on account of increased import of gold. The 80:20 rule made it mandatory for gold importers, especially in the jewellery segment, to export at least 20% of what they had imported. In addition, only selected banks were allowed to import gold. These restrictions were removed once the CAD came down and the rupee stabilzed. However, the trade deficit is going up and the finance ministry feels there is a need to bring back the restrictions. As part of the curbs, the government had increased customs duty on gold to 10% and banned import of gold coins and medallions while RBI linked imports of the metal to exports. But, these measures were easesd in the case of some nominated agencies which imported gold.
