NEW DELHI: The Centre is moving ahead with preparing the regulations under Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act while seeking to provide a further fillip to domestic production of electronic goods, amid increased interest especially in the components space,
IT minister
Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Saturday.
The former IAS officer said there has been significant interest from
component makers
and govt is connecting with the original equipment makers.
While production worth $120-130 billion of electronics goods is currently taking place in the country, employing around 20-25 lakh people, officials in Vaishnaw’s ministry said that the numbers can double in the next five years and the Centre will seek to push an aggressive target in consultation with industry. The minister also said that the idea is to ensure that manufacturing units come up across the country with companies deciding the best location for themselves.
Vaishnaw said fake news and deep fakes are a major cause of concern for all countries and there is a need to deal with this menace. Though he did not elaborate on the roadmap, sources in I&B ministry said govt will have to take opposition parties along to deal with this problem. They added that this can be addressed by bringing legislation. Sources also said govt is looking at coming up with a set of norms for the AI sector in the next few months.
“We are very focused on scaling up manufacturing and getting the component ecosystem,” the minister, who has undertaken a round of assessment since returning to IT ministry during Narendra Modi’s third term as PM.
While India has moved to exporting mobile handsets, apart from meeting its domestic requirement, govt expects a similar situation in the laptops and server segments too. Over 30 companies have received govt clearance to manufacture laptops. Once the component manufacturers are based in India, import dependence will reduce significantly.
Vaishnaw said that IT ministry is planning extensive consultations with all stakeholders for the DPDP rules and was not going to rush ahead with it.
