The last few years have been bitter sweet for the Indian Flat steel sector as a whole. While the overall demand has increased but the increase in import from Japan and Korea is hampering the domestic industries. “In order to protect interests of the domestic industry, Budget needs to revisit last year's hike in excise duty and take steps to discourage dumping of products,” Tata Steel's managing director, H M Nerurkar, said in his Budget wish-list.
'We expect excise duty to come down by 2%, also low import will boost the domestic demand,' said a well know trader based in Mumbai. Market participant in Delhi, Ludhiana, Rourkela and Hyderabad also said there is limited buying of material with buyers waiting for budget to be announced.
The government in the Budget for the current fiscal has enhanced basic customs duty on non-alloy, flat-rolled steel to 7.5 % from 5% earlier. However Excise duty was also hiked at the time.
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