However, he added that the recently-approved Rs 76,000 crore chip policy will help correct this and make India self reliant in this segment
2020 saw India consuming semiconductors worth Rs 1.1 lakh crore, as per industry estimates which were revealed by the Minister of State for Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar in the Parliament.
In a written reply to the Rajya Sabha, Chandrasekhar said that the entire domestic demand was met through imports as there is no electronic chip manufacturing is present in India. However, he added that the recently-approved Rs 76,000 crore chip policy will help correct this and make India self reliant in this segment.
“As per the industry estimate, the semiconductor consumption in India was around Rs 1.1 lakh crore in 2020 which is being met through imports due to absence of commercial semiconductor fabs in India,” the minister said.
He said that due to initiatives of the government and efforts of the industry, the domestic production of electronic goods has increased to Rs 5,54,461 crore (USD 74.7 billion) in 2020-21 from Rs 2,43,263 crore (USD 37 billion) in 2015-16 growing at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 17.9 per cent.
The minister said that beside Rs 76,000 crore semicon programme, the government has also approved modernisation of SemiConductor Laboratory, Mohali as a brownfield Fab.
In reply to a separate question, Chandrasekhar shared that the import of electronic goods increased to Rs 87,169 crore in 2019-20 from Rs 65,779 crore in 2018-19 but reduced to Rs 82,645 crore in 2020-21.
“The export of electronic goods has increased by 25 per cent from 2018-19 to 2019-20 and decreased slightly by 5 per cent from 2019-20 to 2020-21.
“However, in this year, for the corresponding period (April to December), the export of electronic goods has already surpassed the exports of last year (Rs. 55,188 crore) and stands at Rs 81,376 crore,” Chandrasekhar said.
