In the midst of the rising accusations by the opposition parties on how India’s “Make in India” initiative has failed to take off, in just a span of 3 years, the Modi government came out strong by increasing its share in cell manufacturing which was as low as 3 million units to an astonishing 11 million units, surpassing Vietnam and next only to China.
India is now the second largest mobile phone producer in the world after China, as per information shared by Indian Cellular Association with Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.
“We are happy to inform you that with the strenuous and calibrated efforts of government of India, ICA and FTTF, India has now emerged as the second largest producer of mobile handset by volume,” ICA National President Pankaj Mohindroo said in a letter to both the union ministers on March 28.
According to the data shared by ICA, annual production of mobile phones in India increased from 3 million units in 2014 to 11 million units in 2017.
This not only silences the opposition claims of ‘no jobs being created in the manufacturing sector’, but also questions the integrity of the dolt economists who were complaining about the recent step by the Finance Ministry to increase import duty from 15% to 20% in the recently announced budget. Hopefully this step would further help in increasing the amount of cell phone units being manufactured in the country.
The fast track task Force, a body under Ministry of Electronics and IT, has set target to achieve around 500 million mobile phone production in India by 2019, with value estimated to be around USD 46 billion.
The FTTF, which has members from industry and government, has set target to create USD 8 billion component manufacturing as result of growth in mobile phone production and create 1.5 million direct and indirect jobs by 2019.
The body has set the target to export 120 million mobile phone units with an estimated value of USD 1.5 million by the end of next year.
“As long as we bring the right focus on exports, we will be able to achieve these numbers,” Mohindroo said.
