Q.Explain the changes in the composition and direction of India's foreign trade since 1991.

Since 1991, both WHAT India trades and WITH WHOM it trades have diversified considerably from the pre-reform pattern.

India's foreign trade has changed substantially in both its COMPOSITION (what is traded) and its DIRECTION (with whom it is traded) since the economic reforms of 1991, though the exact numeric shares in any given year should always be checked against the latest official trade data rather than assumed fixed.

Composition. Before 1991, India's EXPORTS were dominated by traditional, largely primary or lightly processed goods — agricultural commodities, tea, jute and jute manufactures, and cotton textiles — while its IMPORTS were dominated by capital goods, machinery and petroleum, reflecting an economy still building its basic industrial base. Since liberalisation, India's export basket has diversified considerably to include engineering goods, gems and jewellery, petroleum products refined from imported crude, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, readymade garments, and — distinctively for India — a large and fast-growing trade in SERVICES, especially software and IT-enabled services, now forming a major share of export earnings alongside merchandise goods. On the import side, petroleum and crude oil remain a consistently large and recurring item (since India imports the bulk of its crude oil requirement), alongside gold, electronics, machinery and defence equipment. …

Students sometimes quote specific percentage figures or a specific year's trade data from memory, which risks being outdated or inaccurate — the safer, honest approach is to describe the well-established DIRECTION of change (diversification) rather than inventing or gu …