Govt. wants to make India 'electronic-manufacturing hub': Ravi Shankar Prasad

Highlighting the number of international mobile manufacturing and component manufacturing companies that have entered into the Indian market, Union Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Wednesday said the government intends to make India an electronic-manufacturing hub.

"We want to make India an electronic-manufacturing hub. We have as many as 108 crore mobile phones in the country and we had requested Arun Jaitley ji that they should be manufactured in India only. And as it is there is zero duty in India for it due to international obligations. We had also been given duty differential," Prasad said while detailing the key decisions taken in a meeting with Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley over further incentivising investments in Electronic Sector and moving towards the goal of 'Net Zero imports' in electronics by 2020.

"In the last one-and-a-half years, as many as 42 mobile manufacturing companies have entered the market. And 30 component manufacturing companies have also come. Proposals worth Rs. 26,000 crore have come and the best companies of the world like LG, Bosch Automatic and Samsung among others have also entered the Indian market. Throughout this process, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have been very cooperative," he added.

Specifying the enhancements brought in the M-SIP scheme, Prasad said, "We have modified the M-SIP scheme in terms of the incentives that are being given. Firstly, the applications will be received under the scheme up to December 31, 2018, or till such time that an incentive commitment of Rs. 10,000 crore is reached, whichever is earlier."

"If the investment is worth more than Rs. 10,000 crore then a high-power committee, headed by the Cabinet Secretary, will approve it. The incentives will be available for investments made within five years from the date of approval of the project," he added.

Prasad said these changes have been brought as the government is making an 'extraordinary effort in minimising governance loaded with redundant laws'.

Prasad also quipped the government looks to give employment to over three crore people with the increased incentives.

"Through this, there will be employment generated for more than three crore people," he said.

Commenting on the recently held 'Digi-dhan' melas organised to promote digital payments in the country, Prasad said, "The Digi-dhan melas were held at 24 places in India in which many people came and learnt the dynamics of digital payments. And under the 'Lucky Graahak Yojana', we have awarded 3,81,687 consumers and 21,000 merchants."

Earlier, the Centre had said that they expect the electronics manufacturing market to reach $400 billion by 2020 and that it will focus on electronics manufacturing and plans to set up electronics clusters in 400 towns and cities across India.