Calcutta Diary

AM THE annual ritual of announcing a new import-export policy is over. Some facts however defy propaganda. The country's merchandise exports are only .around Rs 8,000 crore, just a shade above 5 per cent of national income. Even thirty years .ago exports had hovered between 4.5 and 5 per cent of national income. So what is the difference? The ballyhoo over the diversification and sophistication of the economy and one supposedly giant strides in export promotion notwithstanding, the external contribution to our naitional income has not improved, in relative terms, beyond what it was thirty years ago. Were one to compare the average relationship between exports and national income for each of the three decades the same impression will more or