The industry had warned against the restriction on shipments of key components emphasising that handset factories will have to suspend production in the next couple of days if they aren’t cleared
Keeping up with its efforts to ease procedures for electronics manufacturing, the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) has revised the status for the import of specific components including flat panel displays and camera modules to ‘Free’ from ‘Restricted’ with immediate effect.
This move is expected to bring relief to smartphone makers who had feared large scale disruption to local manufacturing.
This is follows a meeting between the IT, finance and commerce & industry ministries. The industry had warned against the restriction on shipments of key components such as flat panel displays and camera modules for smartphones, which were held up by customs since February 9, emphasising that handset factories will have to suspend production in the next couple of days if they aren’t cleared.
“…Directorate General of Foreign Trade, following a meeting between the Ministry of Electronics & IT, Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Commerce & Industry, has agreed to remove restrictions on displays and camera modules that were brought in via a DGFT notification dated 09 February, 2022,” India Cellular and Electronics Association (ICEA) said in a release.
“We continue to believe that such Ease of Doing Business actions, based on consultations with the industry, will help India realize its target of becoming a global hub of electronics manufacturing and exports,” Pankaj Mohindroo, chairman of ICEA, said.
Handset companies had said that the ‘flat panel display’ modules are essential to mobile phones, TVs, notebook & tablet computers and all-in-one PCs (touch and non-touch), and were not manufactured in India. Hence these product segments are completely dependent on imports.
