Received proposals worth Rs 12 trn under PLI scheme: Ravi Shankar Prasad

Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Tuesday said proposals worth Rs 12 trillion have been received under a government scheme to boost electronics manufacturing, and some manufacturing lines have moved from China to India during the Covid-19 pandemic.

"...All the top mobile manufacturers and their contract manufacturers have applied in that (PLI) scheme, including five global champions and five national champions and collectively, they have promised to make mobile phone and components worth Rs 12 trillion in the coming five years, out of which they're going to export Rs 7 trillion (worth of items) and give direct and indirect job to 12 lakh," said Prasad, minister for IT and Communications.

He added that about 8-9 manufacturing lines have also shifted from China to India.

The government notified three schemes on April 1 for the promotion of electronics. These were schemes for manufacturing of electronic components and semiconductors, modified electronics manufacturing clusters (EMC 2.0) scheme, and production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme for large scale electronics manufacturing.

These schemes jointly offer incentives of around Rs 50,000 crore over the period of next five years.

Under the PLI scheme, iPhone maker Apple's contract manufacturers (Foxconn and Wistron), firms like Samsung, Micromax, Lava and Dixon have applied.

Prasad said the government has leveraged technology in a number of areas like healthcare and education to provide support to citizens during the pandemic.

"...out of the Rs 1,70,000 crore that the Prime Minister announced for the whole Covid-19 package for the poor, close to Rs 90,000 crore have been transferred by way of direct benefit transfer to the accounts of people...Therefore, the larger DBT narrative, which we have sent around close to Rs 11 trillion in the last five and a half years...was further reinforced in the Covid-19 crisis," he said.

Prasad said the postal department had also bolstered the efforts.

"Postal department has a wide network all over the country...they not only delivered medicine and other gears in the country, but also delivered close to Rs 2,500 crore in the remotest villages, where there is no ATM or no bank...This is an interesting application of technology in these challenging times," he said.