No plan to immediately cut imports of laptops: IT secretary – Times of India-OxBig News Network

NEW DELHI: Govt does not plan to ask laptop makers to cut down imports to India immediately in the New Year as it believes that local production will grow and gradually mirror the success seen in smartphones, with companies such as HP and Dell boosting local output significantly from the next fiscal, IT and electronics secretary S Krishnan has said.
Simultaneously, to aid the component ecosystem and ensure more companies invest in semiconductors in the country, govt is also finalising a fresh enhanced financial incentive plan to attract new chip makers after the previous $10 billion package was exhausted in the first wave of investments. “We are working on it (new semicon incentive plan) right now. We will seek internal approvals and after that we should take it up,” Krishnan told TOI.
He agreed that at $10 billion, India’s 2023 semiconductor incentive was smaller than other competing economies, such as, Japan, the US, Europe, and China. “All of them are putting out a lot more money. But, they.re putting out a combination, which could mean making some equity investments, or giving debt, or grants.”
India’s case, he said, is a little different. “They are countries where the semiconductor industry already has a base. Our case is about setting up (operations). So, I think we need to have a simple, easy to administer, clean mechanisms which they can take up and run with.” Asked whether India’s package will be bigger this time than the last one, he said, “Definitely not smaller… Hopefully bigger than that.”
Krishnan said laptop manufacturing in the country is expected to start going up from the new fiscal as HP and Dell enhance production under the Rs 17,000 crore production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme, which was announced in 2023 but got off to a slow start in view of the strong imports from China and other manufacturing locations.

He emphasised that govt does not plan to make any immediate restrictions, as this may disrupt supplies. “At no stage was it the intention of govt to disrupt import of any of these electronics. Let’s be clear. We don’t want to disrupt. We just want to convince people that while the availability is ensured, at the same time we bring in more of the actual production within the country,” he said, adding that any decision to reduce imports may happen over a period of time.
Krishnan said the PLI scheme for IT hardware is driven towards improving the competitiveness of India-made products. “The PLI scheme has been structured in a WTO-compliant manner. And it is basically driven towards improving the competitiveness.”
On the current import management system (IMS), he said it has been put in place to keep a close watch on how domestic production as well as the imports are moving. “We look at both elements of it to see that we calibrate our policy effectively and to ensure that at no stage is there a disruption in the market. So, I think that’s the manner in which we move.”