The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has asked the Department of Science and Technology (DST) to allocate dedicated funds for the development of telecom equipment and creation of a local manufacturing ecosystem for their production. Further, the telecom department has sought a plan from DST for the standardisation of telecom technology, product development and commercialisation of the telecom equipments.
DoT has projected that the local demand for telecom equipments will exceed Rs 1,910 billion by 2017 and Rs 2,970 billion by 2020. Therefore, in the absence of local manufacturing of these equipments, most of it would have to be imported.
Earlier, the National Manufacturing Competitiveness Council had proposed the setting up of a fund dedicated to encourage the development of indigenous technologies to boost local telecom equipment manufacturing. The proposal is at present being examined by DoT.
