Bengaluru, NFAPost: Following a meeting between an informal group of ministers and Indian industry, Prime Minister Narendra Modi interacted with ministers and top officials from infrastructure and commerce ministries, to discuss ways to boost local manufacturing and exports amid continuing tensions with China.
India has barred imports from China, especially critical communications infrastructure such as 4G equipment to public telecom companies. Therefore, to make substitutions to the Chinese goods, the government has sought a detailed list of imports from China across essential and non-essential categories from the industry.
However, the Indian telecom regulator plans to cut net imports to zero by 2022 by propeling telecom network equipment production locally to reduce imports and create job opportunities within India.
The Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence and Statistics (DGCIS) data reveals that India imported telecom equipment including mobile phones, parts, and cables worth Rs 1,24,992 crore in 2018-19, and that stood to Rs 70,438 crore alone between April-November 2019 period.
In the meeting, issues pertaining to ease of doing business, local-to-global manufacturing policy and ways to encourage competition between states to attract investment.
Prior to this meeting, Textiles Minister Smriti Irani, Minister of State for Shipping and Chemicals Mansukh Mandaviya and Power Minister RK Singh, met industry captains to discuss non-fiscal ways to boost manufacturing and exports.
The industry has been raising concerns over logistical and infrastructure bottlenecks which is holding back India’s growth.
