Centre, States to brainstorm with top CEOs to script manufacturing growth story

Amiti Sen Updated - November 25, 2017 at 11:02 PM.

Make in India meet today; action plans to boost production, employment on agenda

Top CEOs from across sectors such as Wockhardt’s Habil Khorakiwala, Kirloskar’s Vikram Kirloskar, Hyundai Motor’s YK Lee and Cargill India’s Siraj Chaudhry will put their heads together to chalk out growth plans for their sectors with Union Government officials in the second edition of the Prime Minister’s ‘Make in India’ campaign on Monday.

Two sets of action plans – one for stepping up manufacturing in about 16 sectors over one year, and the other spanning three years – will then be discussed with the Prime Minister. The sectors include automobiles, pharmaceutical and biotech, chemicals, oil and gas, capital goods, metal and cement, food processing, railways, tourism and aerospace.

“Each sectoral action plan will mention ways to handle specific problems being faced by the industry and lay down commitments in terms of what is to be achieved in the areas of manufacturing, employment and attracting investments, both domestic and foreign,” the official said.

CEOs from about 30-35 companies spread across the identified sectors will attend the sectoral meetings with Central government secretaries and principal secretaries of States to discuss issues relevant to them.

Kenichi Ayukawa from Maruti Suzuki, Naveen Jindal from Jindal Steel & Power, R Zutshi from Samsung India, Ajay Shriram from DCM Shriram Ltd, Som Mittal from Nasscom, CS Verma from SAIL, Nik Senapati from Rio Tinto India, Rajiv Modi from Cadila Pharmaceuticals, Jyotsna Suri from The Lalit, Siddharth Roy Kapur from Disney India are some other business representatives scheduled to attend the meeting.

“The industrialists will spell out problems that are holding back growth in their areas. These could be tax related, such as excise duty for the automobile sector or inverted duty structure, or involve other policies such as the need for industrial licences,” the official said.

The secretaries of various Ministries and Departments have already prepared draft action plans for their sectors and would make alterations based on their interaction.

Like the UPA regime, the NDA government, too, has fixed a target of increasing the share of manufacturing in GDP to 25 per cent from 16 per cent. The objective of the ‘Make in India’ campaign is to integrate manufacturing with services sector into one big whole, ensuring creation of jobs, increase production and attract more investments.

Following the launch of the ‘Make in India’ campaign in September, the Centre has put in place a facilitation cell and is also in the process of hiring professionals to carry out a promotional drive to hardsell the country to 500 top global companies.

Published on December 28, 2014 16:56