Television prices will rise as the government increased customs duty on imported panels and other parts used in its manufacturing. However, makers expect the move to help the industry in the long run.
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Terming the customs duty increase as a “logical step”, TV manufacturers have welcomed the government’s move saying it would help the domestic manufacturing industry.
While, presenting the budget, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley proposed to double customs duty on imported panels to 15% from existing the 7.5%. The government has also increased the customs duty on parts of LCD/LED/OLED TVs to 15% from the existing 10% to boost domestic manufacturing.
The Consumer Electronics and Appliances Manufacturers Association (CEAMA) said the impact of the price increase would be “momentary” and have temporary impact.
“I believe that this is a very logical step in terms of increasing configuration in the country... It would have a momentary impact but eventually it would not last more than two months,” CEAMA President Manish Sharma told PTI. The move will not only help the domestic players but also push them to develop capacities for manufacturing components locally.
“I am sure that this would be very positively taken by most manufacturers. There might be a case of a momentary hike in cost, till the time people become ready for open set manufacturing,” he said.
It would also encourage “reverse integration” and “increase the value addition in the country”, he said.
“This would encourage open set assembly in India and price benefits would be passed on to the consumers,” he said, adding that most companies here were doing open set assembling and some were importing panels.
Homegrown consumer electronics firm Videocon said the move would encourage domestic manufacturing and would help the companies engaged in the field of electronics manufacturing.
‘Strengthens MII’
“Increase in customs duty has strengthened the ‘Make in India’ programme which has received a massive boost and will help enormously for the manufacturing sector especially in the field of electronics manufacturing,” said Videocon Chief Manufacturing Officer Abhijit Kotnis.
Expressing similar sentiment, LG India head of corporate marketing Amit Gujral said: “It is good to see that there has been a significant push to boost the Make in India initiative.”
