Exports surge by 26.8 pct in November

India’s exports for the current fiscal year to end-March 2011 will probably touch $210 billion to $215 billion,compared with an earlier target of $200 billion,even though the euro zone debt crisis has started biting into the demand for Indian goods.

There has been been a significant turnaround in engineering goods,which includes car sales,with a growth rate of nearly 50 per cent since April,Rahul Khullar said.

“There is a huge amount of positive growth virtually everywhere.”

India’s exports in November rose an annual 26.8 per cent to $18.9 billion,while imports for the month grew 11.2 per cent on the year to $27.8 billion,provisional data released by Khullar on Wednesday showed.

He said the figures were likely to be revised upwards.

India’s trade deficit in November stood at $8.9 billion compared with $9.7 billion in October.

India’s trade deficit in August had widened to $13.06 billion and Khullar had said then that the deficit could touch $135 billion in the current fiscal year,higher than his earlier forecast for $120 billion.

But on Wednesday he lowered his estimate back to $120 billion based on current trends. A spike in global oil prices could again prompt a revision,he warned.

Oil imports slowed to a growth of 2.3 per cent in November from the double digit growth seen earlier in the year,but Khullar said the figure would probably rise in December and January.