Highlights
- Time for India to capitalise on its competitive advantages, says Baba Kalyani, Chairman of Bharat Forge Group
India, as the third largest economy in Asia, has always set Asian market trends - and long before the ‘Make in India’ movement was born as a state-driven mission, you were one of India’s key drivers in the manufacturing industry. What is the status of the ‘Make in India’ narrative and how far away is India from becoming the world’s hub for manufacturing and engineering?
India is today the third largest economy in Asia and is poised to surpass UK to become the fifth largest economy of the world. Over the last two decades, sustained economic reforms, surging domestic demand and rise in income levels of the large Indian middle class has propelled the country on a relatively steep growth trajectory, making it one of the fastest growing large economies of the world. This period has also seen the emergence of Indian companies making rapid strides on the world stage largely, from the entrepreneurial private sector and representing Information Technology, Automotive, Pharmaceuticals among other industries.
However, India still continues to heavily depend on imports from the developed world in strategic sectors like Defence, Aerospace, Capital Goods, Bio-Medical Equipment among others, which traditionally have been dominated by the state-run public sector companies. As a result, the domestic manufacturing sector has not increased at the same pace at which the overall economy has been growing.
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It is with this backdrop that within weeks of assuming office in 2014, the government under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, launched the “Make in India” initiative with the aspiration to transform the Indian manufacturing sector. The government through this initiative is targeting to take India’s Manufacturing Gross Value Add (GVA) to USD 1 Trillion, increase share of India in world exports from 1.6% to 3.4% and reduce dependence on imports by atleast 10%.
Such strong emphasis of the government in transforming domestic manufacturing sector will progressively result in high technology adoption, large-scale employment avenues, create advanced manufacturing capabilities in the country and enhance overall competitiveness giving a major boost to manufacturing exports and creation of several more India based ‘manufacturing champions’ from the country.
In the emerging digital manufacturing era where Industry 4.0 processes are rapidly being deployed across shopfloors, I see India hob, step and jump by leveraging its highly educated workforce which can easily be trained in digital processes. I therefore strongly believe, the future for India and Indian companies in this sector is bright!
At Bharat Forge Limited, while continuing to further develop our global manufacturing presence in the automotive and industrial segments, inspired by our government’s ‘Make in India’ call, as a company, we are also building advanced design and manufacturing capabilities for critical systems in the defence and aerospace segments.
What are the distinct competitive advantages that India brings to the world stage in terms of manufacturing?
Indian manufacturing industry is at the cusp of a great opportunity. Manufacturing growth in China has slowed considerably. Due to geopolitical reasons global investors have begun to show renewed interest in India. Our government has also seized the initiative and in a series of measures has reformed the country’s foreign investment policy to allow higher levels of investment from abroad in diverse sectors including railways, defence, civil aviation, pharmaceuticals, single brand retail etc. As a result India has become one of the most open economies in the world and rightly positioned to attract large-scale foreign investments.
There are many factors that are working in favour of manufacturing in India. We have a stable government which is committed to economic reforms, our economy is sound and among the fastest growing in the world, our institutions are robust, we have a large and growing domestic market, there are high quality entrepreneurial and professional capabilities available in our country, we have a strong demographic advantage supported by an educational infrastructure that will provide an assured pipeline of trained manpower for years to come.
And initiatives like Ease of Doing Business, Skill India, Digital India among others are complementing the Government’s Make in India initiative and honing up all the critical levers for Indian manufacturing to develop a sustainable competitive edge in the global arena.
As an important ABLF Alumnus, recognised with the ABLF Lifetime Achievement Award, what advice will you give to young people looking to launch their own entrepreneurial dreams?
The geopolitical developments have resulted in a volatile and uncertain business environment across geographies and the emergence of the digital age has resulted in disruptive technologies evolving at an unprecedented pace. Entrepreneurs of this era have to come to terms with such an ever-changing dynamic global environment. Agility, speed, undeterred focus and continuous learning, I believe are of paramount importance to stay ahead in the game.
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