Govt moots law on domestic manufacturing

To promote

'Made-in-India' products within the country, the Ministry of

Communications and IT is expected to issue a mandate wherein it

suggests 30% procurement of the domestically-manufactured electronic

equipments and IT peripherals for PSUs and government undertakings.

In order to

develop Indian intellectual property, a preferential treatment will

be given to local manufacturers. The National Manufacturing

Competitiveness Council (NMCC) has come up with a set of

recommendations while TRAI has also attempted to develop a Telecom

Equipment Manufacturing Policy (TEMP).

The policy

advocates that a 'manufactured in India' product should have a local

value addition at the rate of 25% in the first year of production

while 45% by the fifth year.

India has

allowed 100% FDI in electronics and IT. However, TEMP recommendation

paper argues that WTO does not discourage countries to develop

policies to promote domestic manufacturing. The Committee of

Secretaries has already given a green signal to this proposed policy

while the Cabinet is likely to take it up for final approval.

HCL

Infosystems welcomed the government's effort for creating an

ecosystem for domestic manufacturing. The company said that the

industry today requires policies that will foster a sustainable

ecosystem for innovation, R&D and manufacturing; and maintaining

globally competitive tax regime to enable domestic electronic

manufacturing.

ICT industry

veteran, Ashwini Aggarwal said that the Indian domestic manufacturing

is not getting encouragement due to falling import duties.

“Manufacturing is one of the largest job creators. The government

should promote local manufacturing opportunities, otherwise the

future would be bleak,” he said.

“This would

encourage good practice and it's a good move to attract

investments. The focus should be around getting large investments and

facilitating value addition in the country,” concluded Alok

Bharadwaj, VP, MAIT.