Gadkari urges industry bodies to look after small scale sector

He suggested his own blueprint for 'Atmanirbhar Bharat'

Nitin-Gadkari-2 Nitin Gadkari | R.S. GOPAN

Transport, Heavy Industries and MSME Minister Nitin Gadkari has suggested his own blueprint for 'Atmanirbhar Bharat'—focus on potential sectors the nation's industry can capitalise on and scale them up to attract export business from all over the world.

Gadkari's comments came during an interaction with doyens of Indian industry at the India @75 summit, organised by the industry chamber CII on Saturday.

Gadkari rattled off figures of China's export business, and how ten crucial sectors formed 70 per cent of the country's total exports. This ranges from electrical machinery equipment (671 billion dollars, making up 26 per cent of its total exports), machinery (including computers), furniture, lighting and pre-fab buildings, plastic article, vehicles (including EV), technical and medical apparatus, garments and clothing.

"Indian industry needs to study this. We need to figure out what all from this is being imported into India. If we have to aim for a self-reliant India, we need to enable our MSMEs to import substitute, pollution-free, cost-effective and indigenous products."

The minister suggested that industry bodies like CII should identify sectors to boost exports and reduce dependence on imports, even if it meant imposing import duty to encourage manufacturers to make in India.

Gadkari felt big industries and chambers needed to take initiative to study and come up with a plan on which all sectors in India should intensively focus on, and plan to fine-tune capabilities and expand enough to become an alternative to China for global exports.

Gadkari called on industry organisations to take extra initiative to look after the needs of the small scale sector, as there can be no growth and self-reliance without its active participation. "Industry chambers, I have noticed, tend to focus on the perspective of large scale businesses primarily," he said. "The share of rural, agriculture, tribal and village industries in the country's GDP is negligible. And until that grows, India's overall growth rate, GDP and per capita, will not increase."

The minister was also of the opinion that this will have an added advantage of solving the urban issues of big cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bengaluru and Chennai. "The population of these cities should decrease by seven to eight per cent, shifting to new smart cities coming up. We need to start thinking about it."

The minister also proposed that industries should buy up land on either sides of the 22 new highways being built by the government, including the ambitious Delhi-Mumbai expressway. The idea is to bring in investment and bring development to the backward villages and towns along the route.