By: Shubham Ghosh
THE Narendra Modi cabinet on Wednesday (15) approved a budget of Rs 76,000 crore (£7.5 billion) for designing and manufacturing semiconductor chips in India.
The country’s information and broadcasting minister Anurag Thakur confirmed that the cabinet has sanctioned the amount for the project named ‘Programme for Development of Semiconductors and Display Manufacturing Ecosystem’ to be spent over six years, Asian News International reported.
According to a statement made by the government, the project will have a multiplier effect across different sectors and will facilitate in deeper integration to the global value chain.
It was reported that the project would contribute significantly in achieving a $5 trillion-dollar (£3.7 trillion) economy and $5 trillion gross domestic product by 2025.
Indian telecom and information technology minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said, “Prime minister Narendra Modi has taken a historic decision in the field of Electronics in which the development of a complete ecosystem could take place within the country including design, fabrication, testing and packaging. It would take the investment of Rs 76,000 crore.
Today we have reached USD75 billion (£56.5 billion) in electronics manufacturing in 7 years. With the pace that we are moving at, in the next 6 years, we will reach USD300 billion in electronics manufacturing.”
Thakur also said that the cabinet has approved reimbursement of Rs 1,300 crore (£128 million) on digital transactions using UPI and RuPay debit cards.
“A scheme has been approved to provide incentives to encourage digital transactions through RuPay Debit Card and BHIM UPI of small amounts. It will incur an expense of around Rs 1,300 crore,” he said.