Government proposes to set up National Electronics Mission

NEW DELHI: In a bid to market 'brand India' in electronics, the government has proposed setting up a mission for creating a mechanism to implement various programmes laid down in National Policy of Electronics (NPE).

NPE, cleared by the Union Cabinet in October 2012, aims to make the domestic electronic hardware manufacturing segment into a $400-billion industry by 2020.

Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has said in Parliament that a National Electronics Mission is proposed to be set up with industry participation that will evolve programmes laid down under NPE.

"NPE proposes to set up National Electronics Mission with industry participation to evolve programmes in pursuit of the laid down policies and also to create institutional mechanism to advance the implementation of various programmes," he said.

He added it will promote India as an electronics hardware hub and suitably market "brand India" in electronics.

Under the NPE, government had set objective "to create an eco-system for a globally competitive ESDM (Electronic System and Design and Manufacturing) sector in the country to achieve a turnover of about $400 billion by 2020 involving investment of about $100 billion and employment to around 28 million people at various levels."

The Minister said a draft Cabinet note was circulated in 2011 with the objective of approving the National Electronics Mission and for creating a two tier structure, comprising of National Electronics Advisory Board and National Electronics Commission.

The mechanism was expected to act as a single-window to formulate policies for the consideration of government and suitable delegation of powers was also proposed under this structure.

"The said proposal for delegation powers to the single- window structure was not agreed to by Department of Expenditure and the Planning Commission," Prasad said.