India wants to become ‘a chip maker for a chip taker’
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the Government is working on building a US$300+ billion electronics manufacturing industry over the next three-four years.
Inaugurating the Digital India Week 2022 on 4 July 2022, the Prime Minister said, “Today, India is working on the target of taking electronics manufacturing to more than US$300 billion in the next three-four years.”
India, he stressed, wants to become ‘a chip maker from a chip taker’. “Investment is rapidly increasing in India to increase production of semiconductors.”
Multiple digital initiatives aimed at enhancing the accessibility of technology, streamlining service delivery to ensure ease of living and giving a boost to startups were launched at the Digital India Week, ‘Catalyzing New India’s Techade’ in Gandhinagar.
He also announced the first cohort of 30 institutions to be supported under the Chips to Startup (C2S) Programme.
The Prime Minister elaborated on technology, “India’s FinTech endeavour is truly a solution by the people, of the people, for the people. The technology in it is India’s own, that is by the people.
“The countrymen made it a part of their life, that is of the people. It made the transactions of the countrymen easy, that is for the people.”
“There is scale, security and democratic values in our digital solutions,” he said.
Digital India Week 2022 was held 4-6 July followed by India Stack Knowledge Exchange in virtual mode from 7-9 July.
Details of the initiatives launched:
‘Digital India Bhashini’ will enable easy access to the internet and digital services in Indian languages, including voice-based access, and help the creation of content in Indian languages. The key intervention in building AI-based language technology solutions for Indian languages will be the creation of multilingual datasets. Digital India Bhashini will enable massive citizen engagement to build these datasets through a crowdsourcing initiative called BhashaDaan.
‘Digital India GENESIS’ (Gen-next Support for Innovative Startups) – a National Deep-tech Startup Platform, to discover, support, grow and make successful startups in Tier-II and Tier-III cities of India. A total outlay of ₹750 Crore has been envisaged for the scheme.
‘Indiastack.global’ – a global repository of key projects implemented under India Stack like Aadhaar, UPI, Digilocker, Cowin Vaccination Platform, Government e-Marketplace (GeM), DIKSHA Platform and Ayushman Bharat Digital Health Mission. This offering of India to the Global Public Digital Goods repository will help position India as the leader in building Digital Transformation projects at a population scale and prove to be of immense help to other countries which are looking for such technology solutions.
‘MyScheme’ – a service discovery platform facilitating access to Government Schemes. It aims to offer a one-stop search and discovery portal where users can find schemes that they are eligible for. He will also dedicate to the citizens ‘Meri Pehchaan’- National Single Sign On for One Citizen Login. National Single Sign-On (NSSO) is a user authentication service in which a single set of credentials provide access to multiple online applications or services.
The C2S Programme aims to train specialized manpower in the area of design of semiconductor chips at Bachelors, Masters and Research levels, and act as a catalyst for the growth of Startups involved in semiconductor design in the country. It offers to mentor at the organisational level and makes available State-of-the-art facilities for design to the institutions. This is part of the India Semiconductor Mission to build a strong design ecosystem in semiconductors. fiinews.com