Director General (Acquisitions) Apurva Chandra clarified at a webinar on Friday that ‘We have already launched two programs on it (Chapter 07) and we don’t foresee a change in this (FDI limits)’.
‘Modern’ technologies may reasonably be understood to be a much larger set than ‘state of the art’ technologies. Only a test case would determine what would fly, though.
Our columnist Mark narrates what transpired at Make In India Week and explains why Make In India cannot work in the defence sector under the existing dispensation.
Reactions from industry pointed out that the general rule remained the same, with investment restricted to 26 percent, subject to approval by the Foreign Investment Promotion Board.
Kavi kehna kya chahta hai? Giving the iteration a thumbs-down, defense industry executives questioned the rationale behind some of the amendments and also expressed pessimism, saying in some cased it would ‘make things worse’.
Unsurprisingly, India’s two largest defense suppliers are also the biggest exhibitors at the show. Israel has taken up the most space at the show with 1,293 square meters and Russia brings the largest number of companies to the show, with the count at 37.
Defense Production Secretary Raj Kumar Singh said the Commerce Ministry proposal to increase the FDI limit from the existing 26 percent was under the consideration of the ministerial group.
The Indian industry association, FICCI has argued for limiting FDI in the Indian defense sector to, at most, 49 per cent, following CII, which had submitted similar views last May.
