NEW DELHI: Under pressure from power firms, the government has decided not to impose anti-dumping duty on solar cells imported from nations like the U.S. and China as the move would have led to rise in equipment cost.
"The Finance Ministry has not accepted the recommendations of Commerce Ministry on imposing the anti-dumping duty. Probably the government thinks that levying the duty might hurt power generation in the country with imports becoming costlier," according to a top government source.
To protect the struggling domestic industry, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry in May had recommended imposing a restrictive duty in the range of $0.11-0.81 per watt on solar cells imported from the U.S., China, Malaysia and Chinese Taipei.
The recommendations were against the backdrop of U.S. dragging India to the WTO (World Trade Organisation) with respect to domestic sourcing norms for the national solar mission.
India is of the view that its solar mission - which aims to have 20,000 MW solar capacity by 2022 - is compliant with WTO rules.
Power Minister Piyush Goyal had said domestic solar equipment manufacturing capacity of 700-800 MW is not sufficient to meet the government's ambitious plans of adding more power generation capacity through renewable energy sources.
Ministry for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari had written to Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman opposing plans to levy of anti-dumping duty, saying this would escalate the cost of solar power in the country.
The country's current installed solar capacity exceeds 2,600 MW.
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