Chennai: The telecom sector should make India a hub for telecom equipment manufacturing said Union Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.
He said India is on its way to become a global power with march of technology and asked the industry to focus on innovation around 5G technology to create products with India specific patents.
Prasad stated that India generates huge amount of data and has a potential to emerge as global hub for data analysis, data innovation and data refinery while prioritising privacy.
“India must become a centre of telecom equipment manufacturing… low cost telecom products. COAI should be a partner,” Prasad said at a curtain raiser event of India Mobile Congress at the national capital on Saturday.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) last year recommended for the formation of a unit within the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to promote the manufacture of domestic telecom equipment.
Trai recommended the establishment of a telecom research and development fund (TRDF), with an initial corpus of Rs 1,000 crore. The fund should seek to promote research and innovation for the designing, manufacturing and testing domestic telecom equipment.
“I want mobile sector to ensure that startups (are) encouraged more and more. So, I want mobile sector to work in conjunction with startups,” Prasad said.
He asked the industry to come with innovative 5G products in areas like mobile, healthcare, agriculture and other sectors which have potential to reap its benefit.
Talking about digital data generated in India and gaining importance in the sector, Prasad said the government is coming up with robust data protection legislation and will not compromise on data sovereignty.
Industry body COAI at the event announced that the three day India Mobile Congress will be held between 14-16 October. Telecom Secretary Aruna Sundararajan who was present at the event said the number of exhibitors this time is expected to be double the size of last year’s.
| Up & above |
| * In 2018-19, the production of cellular mobile phones reached approximately Rs 1.7 lakh crore, compared to Rs 18,900 crore in 2014-15.
* The production of mobile phones in volume terms reached 29 crore units in 2018-19, as compared to production of six crore units in 2014-15. |
| Unseen issue |
| Sale of high-end mobile phones in the grey market is causing an estimated loss of Rs 2,500 crore annually to the exchequer, mobile industry body India Cellular and Electronics Association (ICEA) has claimed. It suggested imposing a maximum customs duty of Rs 4,000 on handsets priced above Rs 20,000 to discourage duty evasion and wipe out the premium for illegal sales. A basic customs duty (BCD) of 20 per cent is imposed on imported handsets at present. |