Number of Indian businessmen visiting four neighbouring countries
Figures are in thousands (approximate)

Years Sri Lanka Bangladesh Pakistan China
2005 20 21 5 11
2006 29 22 6 16
2007 40 26 5 22
2008 51 31 6 33


The table breaks up data on number of Indian businessmen who visited India’s four neighbouring countries for four years starting from 2005.

It is clear that Sri Lanka witnessed the highest number of Indian businessmen. When 2005 saw 20000 visits, the figures kept on increasing over the years. The corresponding figures are 29, 40 and 51 thousand. Coming to visits to Bangladesh, the there was a rising trend but it was small compared to Sri Lanka. The numbers are 21, 22, 26 and 31000.

It is very much obvious that India’s trade relation with Pakistan was in very low ebb in this period. The figures stood between 5000 and 6000. But it seems that India maintained good relation with its neighbour China. When 11000 Indian businessmen went to China in 2005, in the following year, the figure went upto 16000, recording more than 5% increase. Again there were remarkable changes. Recording a three times increase from the 2005 figure, it recorded an all time high visit of 33000 businessmen.

That ends the report.