Udyog Manthan: Industry stalwarts guide smaller players towards Aatmanirbhar Bharat

By Shailesh Yadav
New Delhi [India], February 12 : With a marathon of webinars covering 45 diverse sectors for 45 days, Udyog Manthan, an industrial brainstorming exercise being organised by Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry has touched 4.7 million impressions on social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram.
Udyog Manthan focuses on quality and productivity in all major sectors of manufacturing and services covering large industries like Pharma, textiles, automobiles and emerging sectors like CCTV, set-top box among others.
According to DPIIT, the social media outreach has been impressive with 4.7 million impressions in total across various platforms like FB, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram.
"The aim of Udyog Manthan is to fulfil Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision for an Aatmanirbhar Bharat driven by creating a mindset of Quality and Productivity in the Indian Industry. The inauguration on January 6 was presided by Piyush Goyal, Minister of Commerce and Industry who encouraged the organisers for their efforts in making the events successful," said DPIIT.
Speaking to ANI, Vandana Kumar, Joint Secretary, DPIIT said that this brainstorming exercise is organised to discuss the issues of productivity and quality industry over a period of 8 weeks and 45 sessions, where the industry leaders are trying to understand issues of productivity and quality in all the major sector of manufacturing and services.
"So far we have discussed issues in many diverse sectors whether is toys, leather industry, furniture industry or sectors like services, tourism, manufacturing, auto components, shipping or construction industry. We are discussing quality and productivity issue. International best practices have been also discussed," she said.
Anil Agarwal, Joint Secretary, DPIIT said that the discussions are not just about import substitution, but also about how to enter the world market, where India can deliver good quality products.
"You need to compete with the global market not only in quality but also in cost, that is why quality and productivity both has been very important," said Agarwal.
Director-General of Quality Control of India, Dr RP Singh believes that after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's clarion call of Aatmanirbhar Bharat, people of the country have started showing trust in Indian manufacturer and Indian products.
"The mindset of Indians is that even if the cost of production is little more, they will prefer the indigenous products. Indian industry is well prepared to have the products which are equivalent or better in quality than the imported products. All we have to do is to ensure that if we have a supply chain, if we have the entire ecosystem where the raw material is also produced in India, then the manufacturing processes will be very good quality," Singh said.
He further said that the Quality Control of India and National Productivity Council are helping the industries in making their products of higher quality.
Rahul Bharti, Head, Corporate Planning and Investor Relations, Maruti Suzuki said that sectors like automobiles have to be globally competitive in order to compete in the market.
"Quality and cost are the two biggest pillars, and cost comes from productivity. It has been Maruti Suzuki's experience that because of these two pillars we have very good market share in India, more than 50 per cent market share only on basis of this and are able to export about hundred countries of the world. We have been spreading these practices to all the manufacturers, automobile components manufacturers. This Udyog Manthan is definitely going to help our domestic players to compete globally," Bharti said.
Rajkumar Dutta, Managing Director, Action Group, in shoe manufacturing market, India only lack aesthetic, which can be improved with government's help.
"Total 10 billion crore pair of shoes are manufactured in the world. Out of this 7.5 billion pairs of shoes are produced by China, while India produces only 2 billion pairs. However, our quality is best in the world and India has the potential to triple the manufacturing also. We only lack aesthetic design, which we want to improve with the help of the government," said the Action Group MD.
National Productivity Council Chief Arun Kumar Jha believes that India can achieve Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of USD 5 trillion economy by industrialisation, better production and creating more employment.
"To compete with global players Indian manufacturer will have to focus on quality and productivity. We have to give away the ''Chalta hai' mindset. Big companies in various sectors like furniture, footwear among others have assured that they will guide the smaller players in replicating best practices in improving Quality and Productivity," added Jha.
Smaller players who are participating in Udyog Manthan are happy that industry stalwarts and representatives from industry bodies and Certification Councils are answering their queries. The webinars have garnered positive response from different corners, creating anticipation about the upcoming sessions. It is hoped that practical recommendations that come up in the webinars will aid the government of India in making sustainable policies to step forward the vision of Aatmanirbhar Bharat.