Sajjan Jindal urges co-industrialists to source locally, shun Chinese goods

Currently, JSW Group imports material worth $400 million from China but aims to bring it down to nil over the next two years

A few days after his son lashed out at imports from China, Sajjan Jindal, chairman of the $12-billion JSW Group, blamed the complacency of the domestic industry for increased dependency on cheaper Chinese imports.

“A lot of my friends and co-industrialists are upset as their business with China is important to maintain healthy margins and continuity. But this situation has come because of our complacency in blindly accepting cheaper imports from China rather than developing our own domestic vendors,” Jindal said today via company statement.

Currently, the JSW Group imports material worth $400 million from China but aims to bring it down to nil over the next two years.

The company sources machinery parts from China for its steel, energy and cement business.

“This is an opportunity for us all to come together and push for a stronger Atma Nirbhar Bharat. Let us support our domestic producers in achieving quality and scale. We have to show loyalty to our own products. We have to support our armed forces and the government and prove that we stand with them in this fight against Chinese,” said Jindal.

India continues to be heavily dependent on imports from China in the auto, pharmaceutical and electronics sectors.

In the auto sector, India imported auto parts worth $4.2 billion from China in 2019, according to Auto Component Manufacturers' Association of India (ACMA) data.

Meanwhile, in steel, though import of total finished steel from China declined by 22 percent on year-on-year basis in FY20, the dragon country's dumping strategy has triggered several protective measures from the ministry of steel since 2016.