Govt clears Rs 961 crore investments in electronics sector

Investments from Bosch and Samsung were among the first set of Rs 961 crore proposals under National Policy on Electronics cleared by the government today.

"This is first tranche of investment where we have moved forward with around Rs 1,000 crore. We have firm applications of Rs 4,600 crore. As we move forward, in a month or so we will clear that because now we have set up parameters for clearance as well," Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal said here.

He added that government has set a target to attract investment of Rs 25,000 crore by end current fiscal.

The investment proposals cleared by government for electronics production include Rs 544 crore from Bosch Electronics in automotive electronics segment, Rs 406 crore from Samsung Electronics for manufacturing of mobile phones in the country and Rs 11.1 crore from Indian firm Sahasra Electronics for manufacturing LED lights in Noida.

Samsung and Bosch will each get 25 per cent subsidy benefit while Sahasra will get 20 per cent benefit on investment under the policy.

"Going forward, we have 14 applications of around Rs 4600 crore. These will be processed within next 4 to 6 weeks," Electronics and IT secretary J Satyanarayana said.

Talking about total investment proposal, DEITY Joint Secretary Ajay Kumar said "These are firm applications. These are in the field of consumer electronics, handheld devices, strategic electronics, LED, telecom products, electronics components and ATMP (Assembly, Test, Marking and Packaging)."

Department of Electronics and Information Technology also deliberated at investment of Rs 2,100 crore for setting up three green field electronics cluster.

"On electronics cluster front the story is pretty encouraging. Investments have come forward in these clusters.

The total number of investment are also about Rs 2,100 crore. This also shows investors are realising that great market opportunity in electronics sector in this country," Sibal said.