Recently, India’s Ministry of Finance has decided not to execute its anti-dumping investigative body’s proposal in May to impose duties against solar panels imported from PRC, Taiwan, the United States and Malaysia. This decision marks the closure of India’s anti-dumping investigation against imported solar panels initiated in November, 2012.

India’s anti-dumping investigative body issued its final ruling on May 22, 2014, proposing anti-dumping duties on solar panels and modules imported from the four abovementioned economies, ranging from 11 US cents to 81 US cents per watt. According to Indian anti-dumping laws and regulations, India’s Ministry of Finance was to announce its decision to impose those duties no later than August 21 if it chose to accept the proposal. However, by August 25, there is still no announcement from Indian Customs about the anti-dumping duty. Some reports have indicated that India’s Minister of Finance, Minister of Commerce and Industry as well as Minister of Energy have discussed over this issue and decided against the proposal.

AllBright’s international trade team, commissioned by the China Chamber of Commerce for the Import and Export of Machinery and Electronic Products, defended the Chinese industry on the grounds that it did not cause any harm to India’s domestic industry. The team also identified mistakes Indian investigative body had made during the procedure, including qualification of establishing the case, the range of products, the definition of a domestic industry, the possible harm of the domestic industry and the connection between reasons and results. The AllBright team has also guided the Chinese industry to proactively lobby against the investigation in India to highlight the factual and legal problems of this case.