India has decided to impose restrictions on the import of colour television sets, in an attempt to encourage domestic production of the sets.
There will now be a licence required for import on certain categories of televisions.
Let’s learn more about this.
Import Restriction on Selective Categories
The Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) quoted in a notification released on Thursday, “Import policy of colour television sets, is amended from ‘free’ to ‘restricted’”.
The important point here is that not all categories of TVs have import restrictions on them.
This restraint is applicable under the ‘other colour’ category of television sets, encapsulating the very famous LCD TVs, among others.
On a similar note, there is no such restriction on the category of monochrome TVs.
India Imports 35% Television Sets
India holds a free trade agreement (FTA) with Asean countries. This gives China a chance to route its products in India through Vietnam, which is a member country of Asean.
Through this step, India plans to put a stop on indiscriminate imports from China and other countries like Thailand and Malaysia, through this FTA route.
If we speak numbers and figures:
- The restricted category alone attracted $781 million worth of imported TV sets, in just fiscal year 2020.
- Vietnam contributed $428.37 million, while China accounted for $292.48 million of the amount.
- Currently, India imports 35% of TV sets in the country.
A Push to ‘Make in India’ Initiative
As previously mentioned, India is working rigorously towards boosting domestic manufacture, thus cutting on imports.
In fact, just last month, the DGFT put restrictions on importing certain new pneumatic tyres, which are used in two wheelers and four wheelers, to promote the manufacturing in India and check on cheap products from China.
The Chairman of Dixon Technologies believes that such a move shall boost self-reliance and carve a path for ‘Make in India’ initiative.
“India has the capability to manufacture television sets across all sizes and this will spur those investments”, he quoted.
Panasonic India too seemed to be happy with this decision, claiming that such a step shall increase the value of television manufacturing industry.