Policy for capital goods introduced

The government introduced a National Capital Goods Policy to spur capital goods sector and the Make in India initiative.

Anant Geete, Minister, Heavy Industry and Public Enterprise unveiled the policy during the Make in India Week programme and said it was part of the government’s commitment to turn the country into a world class hub for capital goods. Mr.Geete said the objective of the policy was to increase production of capital goods from Rs. 2.30 lakh crore in 2014-15 to Rs. 7.50 lakh crore in 2025 and raising direct and indirect employment from the current 8.4 million to 30 million. The policy envisages making India a net exporter of capital goods and aims at facilitating improvement in technology across sub-sectors, increasing skill availability, ensuring mandatory standards and promoting growth and capacity building of MSMEs, Mr. Geete said.

Addressing a seminar on capital goods sector organized by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in partnership with Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) and the Government of Maharashtra, Mr. Geete said, “The aim is to create game-changing strategies for the capital goods sector.”

Some of the key issues addressed include availability of finance, raw material, innovation and technology, productivity, quality and environment-friendly manufacturing practices, promoting exports and creating domestic demand.

The key policy recommendations include strengthening the existing scheme of the DHI (Department of Heavy Industry) on enhancement of competitiveness of capital goods sector by increasing budgetary allocation and increasing its scope to further boost global competitiveness in various sub sectors and enhancing export of Indian made capital goods through a ‘Heavy Industry Export and Market Development Assistance Scheme (HIEMDA)’.

It has also made provision for introducing a Technology Development Fund, upgrading existing and setting up a new testing and certification facility, making standards mandatory in order to reduce sub-standard machine imports and at the same time providing opportunity to local manufacturing units by utilising their installed capacity and unveiling scheme for skill development for capital goods sector.

Sumit Mazumder, President, CII said the government has taken ‘unprecedented and innovative’ steps with multi-dimensional endeavour to boost manufacturing and improving ease of doing business.