India’s Trade with the Socialist Countries

Abstract

The last two decades have witnessed a phenomenal growth in trade between the less developed countries of the Third World and the socialist countries. India has been very much a part of this trend. In 1952/53, the value of India’s trade with the socialist bloc was a mere $9.2 million. By 1972/73, it had risen to $910.3 million. As a result, the combined share of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, the USSR and Yugoslavia in India’s total trade increased from less than 0.5 per cent to more than 18 per cent. This remarkable expansion occurred in a framework of bilateral trade agreements,¹ the principal feature of which was that payments for all transactions were made in rupees.