India Government – in its budget 2023 — on Wednesday reduced basic custom duty (BCD) on import of certain mobile phone parts and inputs like camera lens and continued the concessional duty on lithium-ion cells for batteries for another year.
India’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the move is to further deepen domestic value addition in manufacture of mobile phones.
“The mobile phone production in India had increased from 5.8 crore units valued at about Rs 18,900 crore in 2014-15 to 31 crore units valued at over Rs 275,000 crore in the last financial year, as a result of various initiatives of the government, including the Phased Manufacturing program,” she said during her Union Budget 2023-24 speech in Parliament.
She also proposed to reduce the BCD on parts of open cells of TV panels to 2.5 percent to promote value addition in the manufacturing of televisions.
Gururaj, MD, Optiemus Electronics, said that “continuing the import duty cuts on camera lens and batteries for mobile manufacturing is a welcome step and this will continue to fuel the remarkable growth India has witnessed in domestic manufacturing.”
Pankaj Mohindroo, Chairman of India Cellular and Electronics Association (ICEA), earlier said that tariffs on inputs and components were an important barrier to increasing localisation.
ICEA had recommended that the tariff of 2.75 percent (including social welfare surcharge), among other smaller tariffs, which have no beneficial impact and only create a burden for legitimate manufacturers, should be removed. ICEA also recommended reducing the inputs of the open cell at zero duty.
