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National Manufacturing Policy
With the introduction of the National Manufacturing Policy, 2011, India envisioned capacity expansion and sustainable growth. As the NMP is approaching its target deadline of 2022, this article is a reality check on the progress of its major objectives. Introspecting these objectives, it argues for the need to devise and enact the rehabilitation of manufacturing strategies to suit the changing times.
After the global financial crisis (GFC) of 2008, there is wide consensus among the policymakers on the need for an enhanced role of the government in facilitating sustainable industrial growth and employment creation. The need for the new industrial policies in the developed countries also stems from employment displacing globalisation, technological disruption, and industrial success of south-eastern countries over the last decade.
However, India has always recognised the regulatory and market-based policy interventionist role of the government in facilitating industrial development since the planning era. India introduced major industrial policies in June 1991 that aimed to reduce the entry barriers to Indian industries, embraced open-door policies towards foreign direct investment, and reformed public sector entities that allowed disinvestment. Post GFC, India initiated the National Manufacturing Policy (NMP) in 2011 to tap the economic opportunities of the sector and attain sustainable economic growth (GoI 2011a; Mani 2011). It has been close to a decade since India embarked on the new industrial policy that aimed to achieve its major objectives by 2022. The policy aimed at increasing the manufacturing sector contribution to 25% of national gross domestic product (GDP), creating 100 million additional jobs, skilling of rural migrants and urban poor, improving domestic value addition and technological depth, enhancing global competitiveness, and ensuring the sustainability of growth in terms of energy efficiency and optimal utilisation of natural resources. As the envisioned objectives of the NMP to be attained are nearing their stipulated deadline, there is a pressing need for the evaluation of the same. Therefore, in this article, we make an overarching evaluation of the progress of the NMP. This assessment will be a reality check on the progress or regress of the industrial development achieved since 2011. Further, the ex post evaluation will also highlight the emerging industrial issues that would facilitate redesign and rehabilitate future manufacturing policies.
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