WASHINGTON, Oct 19: Indian courts are more impartial, objective and fair in dealing with trade-related issues than the American ones which defer too much to the government agencies, a leading US trade judge and a prominent lawyer said on Friday.Speaking at a panel discussion organised by the Indian embassy here, Thomas J Aquillino, a judge at the US Court of International Trade said the whole process in the US was ``politicised'' and judges defer to much to the government agencies.He, along with trade lawyer Jean Anderson, said even in cases remitted back by the the agencies refuse to change their initial decisions.Among others who participated in the discussions were U L Bhat, a former High Court Chief Justice who is now president of India's Customs, Excise and Gold Appellate Tribunal, Lakshmi Kumaran, adviser to the Government of India on trade and intellectual property matters and Kanti Tripathi, minister in charge of commerce in the Indian embassy.Tripathi said Indian exporters were facing difficulties in entering the US market due to a number of barriers, including non-tariff ones, as many of the restrictions were applied in an inconsistent manner.Pointing out such aberrations, Tripathi said Indian exporters meet the strict quarantine laws of France and Germany when they export Indian mangoes but have so far failed to enter the US markets, though the laws are quite the same.Audiences were surprised to learn that in 55 to 65 per cent of the trade-related cases, the court's decisions went against the government.Bhat told the US experts that the Indian judiciary at every level is fiercely independent and does not allow the executive to influence it.He said a growing Indian industry under pressure to export more and more will soon face the twin trade weapons of the developed world - countervailing duties and anti-dumping duties.Anderson, detailing how her country's establishment was instrumental in unabashed use of these weapons, said, ``Our whole anti-dumping and countervailing duty laws in the US have become increasingly politicized very understandably because, when you lower trade barriers, the dumping law is the refuge of last resort.''The US agencies, she said, have been charged by the congress, through a series of legislative measures, to ``very strictly enforce our unfair trade laws to the benefit of domestic petitioner industries.''``Even if the agencies tried to ignore it, (they) are subject to political pressure, from the domestic industries and, sometimes, from the political appointees in the administration,'' she added.Kumaran said the American countervailing duties and anti-dumping laws have been enforced for a century, the first case being in 1897 against a Russian import.``We are learning from you,'' he said in a lighter vein, evoking a lot of mirth. In India anti-dumping laws were enacted only in 1985 but in fiscal 1988 they are expected to be a maximum of 25 per cent .
