No fresh buying by the price-elastic consumer has led India's gold imports to hit a 13-year low in 2009. The trend though had changed in the second quarter but a full recovery has not been seen yet.

World Gold Council published a report recently which showed that the total import of gold in 2009 was just 459 tonnes which is the lowest since 1997. WGC, a body funded by global miners, published in the report that for the first time after 1997 India's gold import had fell below 500 tonnes.

A meager 42 tonnes gold was imported in the first quarter owing to the Diwali season and the marriage season later in the year, the scenario changed gradually and took a U-turn, with the end-quarter imports rising to 180.7 tonnes, which is higher by 17 per cent from the 154.4 tonnes in the earlier quarter and 13 per cent more than the 159.6 tonnes in the corresponding quarter of the previous year.

The rural community also started spending their savings it had held in cash deposits and also the non-resident Indians indulged into a lot of buying at the end of year when they came home reversing the downtrend and bringing some respite to the gold imports.