₹20 lakh-crore for manufacture of medical devices and mobile phones

NEWDELHI: The Cabinet on Saturday announced three schemes to boost the production of electronic components, especially in the field of medical equipment and mobile phone manufacturing, and pledged an investment of ₹20 lakh crore in the next five years to generate 25 lakh jobs.

The decisions are significant because India imports between 80% and 90% of complex but critical medical devices such as ventilators, which have emerged the key to tackling Covid-19.

One scheme involves a production-linked incentive, another aims to promote the manufacture of electronics components and semiconductors, while a third seeks to encourage multinational firms to invest upwards of ₹300 crore in manufacturing clusters.

Manufacturing clusters would have a minimum area of 200 acres comprising industry-specific facilities such as facility centers, ready factory sheds and plugand-play facilities.

“Two long-term policy decisions have been taken to make India a big hub of manufacturing, first in the case of electronic and

second in the case of pharma and medical devices,” said Union minister of electronics and information technology Ravi Shankar Prasad. “In the next five to six

years, we intend to spend about ₹20 lakh crore in the electronics manufacturing industry to give jobs to 25 lakh people. The industry will have a big role in the $1 trillion dollar mission,” he said.

“We want to invite global companies to India to produce goods, and we will also nominate two, three or four Indian companies as champions,” Prasad said.

The Centre hopes to increase domestic value addition of mobile phones from the current level of 20%-25% to 35-40% by 2025, and provide over 8 lakh jobs in the process. Prasad said the value of electronics produced in India has reached ₹4,58,006 crore in 2018-19 from ₹1,90,366 crore in 2014-15, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of about 25%. These changes will be in line with the National Policy on Electronics, he said.

Pankaj Mohindroo, chairman of the Indian Cellular and Electronics Association, said the schemes could be a gamechanger. “The new PLI Scheme would not only support the government’s efforts to establish India an integral part of the Global Value Chain (GVC) in the mobile handset sector, but this step will also help develop Indian Champion companies to tap the global as well as Indian markets through these specific production incentivisation measures,” Mohindroo said in a statement.

NEWDELHI: The Cabinet approved the signing and ratification of an extradition treaty between India and Belgium that will enable the two countries to repatriate from each other any person who is accused of or convicted in an extraditable offence. The decision was taken on Friday and announced Saturday.

An extraditable offence means an offence punishable under the laws of both the countries with imprisonment for a period of one year or more. Under the treaty, extradition shall be refused if the offence involved is political in nature. However, the treaty specifies certain offences which will not be considered as political offences, official statement said.

The treaty would provide a legal framework for seeking extradition of terrorists, economic offenders, and other criminals from and to Belgium. After ratification, the treaty will enter into force from date of exchange of instruments of ratification between India and Belgium.

The new extradition treaty will replace the pre-independence extradition treaty between Great Britain and Belgium of 1901.