By TIOL News Service

MUMBAI, JULY 07, 2015: THE Centre has asked the industry to avail of the benefits of the recently launched Capital Goods Scheme which would help in acquiring or developing new technology. Speaking at the inauguration of a workshop in Mumbai yesterday, Union Minister for Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises, Mr Anant Geete expressed concern over increasing imports of Capital Goods. He said the technology gap between the developed countries and developing countries is widening in the Capital Goods Sector. The workshop on "Technology Development for Capital Goods: Constraints and the Way Forward," was jointly organized by the Department of Heavy Industries and FICCI.

The Minister said "the technological capabilities of large number of players, especially in the SME sector, are limited in India and as a result India has become one of the largest importers of capital goods in the world. This has adversely affected the indigenous capital goods industry and we want to change this now" he added.

Mr Geete informed that his Ministry is committed to bring ‘Achche Din’ for the Capital Goods Sector and informed that his Department would set up Technology Adoption Fund to promote Research and Development in the industrial sector.

The Capital Goods Scheme launched under the Make in India initiative of Government of India provides support to the industry to acquire technology, set-up technology development centres in collaboration with Institutes, and create common infrastructure for the capital goods industry. A unique component of the scheme is technology acquisition fund where government is giving support upto 25 per cent of the cost of technology subject to the limit of Rs. 10 crore.

The Capital Goods Scheme is expected to be particularly helpful for the industry in Maharashtra as a large number engineering and capital goods clusters covering textiles machinery, machine tools, plastic machinery and engineering products are located in the state.