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shadows, able and willing to fully engage as both a complaining and defending member. India’s absence from the international trade scene changed substantially upon the creation of the Dispute Settlement Body in the year 1995 at the Uruguay round of agreement between the member nations. In the first five years of the WTO dispute settlement system – between 1995 and 2000 – India could be seen as one of the most active members in the dispute settlement system. Many of the early disputes in which India was actively involved became landmark WTO decisions establishing important precedents. As of January 2019, India has acted as a complainant in 24 cases, as a respondent in 25 cases and as a third party in 150 cases . India’s complaints typically involve trade goods such as textiles and clothing and antidumping claims. When India is a respondent, the complaints usually involve quantitative restrictions, the agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, anti-dumping claims and tariffs and other trade restrictions.

India’s role in the dispute settlement mechanism began in the DSM’s birth year itself when India requested consultations with Poland regarding Poland’s preferential tariff treatment of automobile from the EC. This dispute was amicable settled by both parties which was notified on 16th of July, 1996 and did not subsequently proceed to the panel stage.

Mr. Abhijith Das and Jayanth Raguram opines that given that the Dispute Settlement Understanding is not an exhaustive code of procedural and substantive rules on WTO dispute settlement, most of the concomitant gaps on these aspects have often had to be bridged by panel and Appellate Body jurisprudence. In this context, it would be important to note that many disputes in which India has either been a complainant or a respondent have generated new jurisprudence on various and critical aspects of WTO dispute settlement. In some of these disputes, such as EC-GSP and Turkey-Textiles, jurisprudence has been developed on multiple aspects whereas in other disputes such as US-Shrimp they have focused on a sole but crucial aspect. These disputes are of such significant status that no understanding of WTO dispute settlement law and practice can be complete without appreciating the key jurisprudence developed in these particular disputes.

It is relevant to provide a brief of some of the cases wherein India has played an i