The proposal of the Budget 2018-19 to develop two defence industrial production corridors is expected to promote indigenous manufacturing of defence equipment in the country. “The provision for the development of 2 defence industrial production corridors in India, will boost indigenous manufacturing and make India more self-reliant for its defence needs,” said Ashwini Aggarwal, Chairman, India Electronics & Semiconductors Association (IESA), the premier trade body representing the Indian Electronic System Design and Manufacturing (ESDM) industry.

Commenting on the budget 2018, Aggarwal said, “The Government has executed path-breaking reforms like GST and the bankruptcy bill in the recent years. The budget’s objective was to build on the evolving economic scenario with enablers for private sector investments. Announced MSME benefits augur well for the industry. Stated ESDM/electronics sector focus is good with various measures taken to make it easier to do business across sectors. With this, the industry hopes for appropriate kick-start packages to enable Make in India in this sector, we hope to see this in the fine print.”

Welcoming measures for regulating regimes for venture capital funds and angel investors, he stated that the move will ensure a further boost, especially to the start-up sector. Increased scholarships for select 1000 BTech students for PHDs at IITs and IISCs will strengthen domain knowledge and drive the innovation ecosystem.

The budget has also laid a lot of stress on improving the education system and set aside funds for training of untrained teachers, and doubled allocation for skilling with a special focus on new technology areas. “Additionally, the use of blockchain will be encouraged to provide further impetus to the digital economy and fast-track the Digital India vision of the government. There is also the most important announcement around revolutionising healthcare and universal access to it. This will bring in a lot of attention to telemedicine and impact it will have on the holistic healthcare needs of approximately 50 crore beneficiaries,” said Ashwini Aggarwal.

He added, “Overall, this year’s budget has raised the bar for the expectations of making India a self-reliant economy with the best set of skilled workforce and taking a huge leap towards being a global technology and manufacturing hub."