New Delhi, Oct 31 (IANS): Amid the instances of big ticket projects moving to Gujarat, the Ministry of Electronics and IT has approved the greenfield Electronics Manufacturing Cluster (EMC) with the project cost of Rs 492.85 crores to be set up in Ranjangaon Phase III, near Maharashtra's Pune.
Making the announcement, Minister of State for Electronics & IT, Rajeev Chandrasekhar said: "We already have EMCs in Noida, Tirupati, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu - wherein both multi-national companies and Indian startups have set up their units. The Government of India is the enabling partner in these EMCs and it is working in tandem with the state governments to make these EMCs a catalyst for the electronics manufacturing in the state."
He added that the EMC at Ranjangaon, Pune will catalyse investments to the tune of over Rs 2,000 crore in the near future and generate employment for over 5,000 people.
The Minister also announced that the Ministry of Electronics and IT plans to give a boost to the Rs 1,000 crore Semicon India Future Design programme to support semiconductor design startups in the state and shall soon visit Maharashtra for a roadshow. He informed that C-DAC, Pune shall be the nodal office for this purpose.
The approval for the EMC was given to Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) and the state government's State Industrial Agency.
The Minister said that post Covid, it has become very competitive for the countries/states to corner the opportunities that have sprung up following disruptions in global value chains and supply chains.
Stating that electronics manufacturing has seen an exponential rise after Prime Minister Modi took over in 2014, Chandrasekhar said it has increased to six lakh crores from one lakh crores in 2014.
"While 92 per cent of all mobile phones used by Indian customers were imported in 2014, now 97 per cent of all mobile phones used by Indian customers were domestically manufactured. We had zero exports in electronics manufacturing space in 2014, at present we export equipment worth Rs 70,000 crore," he elaborated.