Manufacturing
1. Issue on Inverted duty structure by indigenous manufacturers have been taken care of by the following measures:
A. Special Additional Duty (4%) on all inputs/components used in the manufacture of Personal Computers (laptops/desktops) and tablet computers is being exempted.
B. Duty structure on imported and manufactured computers have been brought at par by withdrawing exemption of CESS (0.3%) on imported computers.
2. E-book readers has been exempted from BCD (7.5% earlier), benefitting education and other sectors.
3. Some telecom products (non-ITA) have been made liable to 10% BCD whereas all goods required for manufacture of aforesaid telecom products would continue to enjoy exemption from BCD. This will encourage manufacturing.
4. Apart from the above, MAIT had recommended other far-reaching measures to boost manufacturing of IT hardware products significantly. MAIT is quite hopeful that they will be taken up in the current year.
Technology Penetration
1. Digital India – Will launch broadband connectivity at village level, with Rs 500 crore allocation. This is likely to boost penetration and e-governance. We await specifics on the scheme around this initiative.
2. Government has proposed a fund of Rs. 100 crores for setting up virtual classrooms as Communication-Linked Interface for Cultivating Knowledge (CLICK) and online courses.
Market Acceleration
1. SMEs given lot of emphasis. Rs. 10,000 crores corpus proposed for venture capital to encourage start-ups and entrepreneurs in the MSME sector.
2. e-Governance Projects: All govt depts, ministries to be integrated through E-platform by 31 Dec 2014.
3. Rs. 7060 crores have been allocated for Smart City projects. This will significantly push ICT deployment and ICT device penetration.
Cost of Doing Business
1. Government has initiated a number of actions including increasing FDI limit in defense and insurance sectors which will improve the investment climate.
2. On retrospective taxes, the government has given positive statements.
3. Finance Minister has initiated a discussion with states to work out GST-related implementation issues.
4. Provide investment allowance at 15% for 3 yrs to manufacturing companies which invest more than Rs 25 cr in plant and machinery.
5. Investments in roads and ports will improve infrastructure connectivity, improving the ease of doing business.
