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Journalism of Courage
Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha would renegotiate the agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights TRIPs, one of the Uruguay Round agreements which has given successive Indian governments such a headache in recent years. This is the agreement under which India is required to amend its patents law, something it has failed to do since 1995.
India recently lost both a case brought against it by the United States in the World Trade Organisation and its own appeal against the WTO8217;s initial ruling. As things stand, after losing the WTO case and appeal, India is ordinarily required to amend its law in line with TRIPs by the end of next year. Sinha8217;s talk is based on a lot of wishful thinking on India8217;s part and some domestic muscle-flexing on the Finance Minister8217;s. The crucial part of Sinha8217;s statement is that the attempt to negotiate the agreement will be based on cooperation with like-minded developing countries. But where is the critical mass that India would need for such amove?
But even if that were possible, India has not allowed itself even that elbow room, thanks largely to the BJP itself: anything viewed as a concession in the WTO is guaranteed to set off a row. In any case, TRIPs was not pushed through by the developed world only in order to allow its renegotiation. Given the history of world trade negotiations in recent years, it defies the imagination that a reversal of the liberalisation achieved in any sector in the Uruguay Round could be agreed to by WTO members. Worst of all, perhaps, India has repeatedly misjudged the international mood and ended up looking rather silly in trying to forge developing-world unity where manifestly none existed. There is no reason at all to assume that where it lost out on several previous occasions, India will win this time. The BJP really should concede with good grace that India hascommitted itself to amending its patent law, and get on with the job so that this issue does not become an albatross round India8217;s neck in other trade and diplomatic dealings.
