Why can't India be a World-Class Player in Manufacturing Industry as it is in IT & BPO Sectors?

According to my view we are not as good in manufacturing as compared to BPO's/IT sectors because every one in today's fast world want to make money in quick succession. In IT's/BPO's you can operate from a room on a server and make quick money and get your company benefited. But in manufacturing field we have to struggle. Look for resources, raw material, permission from govt agencies which is a long process because corrupt politician and bureacrats delay the whole things, huge amount of money and patience. Since we are lacking in spirit and resources, opting for manfacturing carrier is not fruitful. Just take an example of TATA Nano factory at Singur West Bengal. Once the whole thing is set up and the company was about to delivered the cars in the market, the politics started its dirty game and forced TATA to shut the manfacturing plant. Here, the focus is not development but the focus is on vote bank because we technology will reach in villages the people will be more educated and advanced. They can think what is wrong and right. So our politicians think that the villagers should not experience a steep progress so that their mind is changed. Due to problem like acquisition of land, mining, lack of raw materials, lack of infrastructure, roads connectivity manfacturing plant in India is still a dream come ture.

It is due to the some reasons as-.

If we want to start an IT/BPO company we hardly needs a small room, 8-10 computers & 10-15 employers which can work for long on a lower amount of pay-scale because we have a huge manpower.

But to start a manufacturing company we need a very large area, very expensive machines & very well trained manpower which needs a very big money investments.

So without the cooperation of the government it is not quite possible to start this industry.

As we can take the examples of IC fabrication labs, and nano-technology. Nano-tech was initiated in India but its developing in USA just because of the money.

There are several factors because of which India has not been able to develop into a manufacturing superpower. The major ones are:

1. India, barring a few states, is a power deficient country, there are no proper Power, logistics and transport facilities readily available.

2. We are surplus in labour but rarely the labour is skilled, this can be accounted mainly due to focus on academics and lack of practical knowledge. Managing and upgrading skills is poor and need major overhauling.

3. India has stringent labour laws, workers cannot be employed from so and so states, political backing, labour unions etc.

4. Lack of transparency on processes and clearances. There are no proper demarcations afa processes are concerned at state and central levels. File clearances, bribes to be offered, babus involved etc. One major example is that of POSCO project not getting clearance and the infamous "Jayanti Tax". Kumarmangalam Birla recently announced his reluctance to invest 4000 crores in business due to the lack of support from the government.

5. Lack of investment in R&D and strategic planning. Most of goods finished products have to be imported. Arms, cosmetics, etc.

6. Political interests, land disputes etc. Ex. TATA NANO -Singur case.

7. Mindsets, people in India prefer White colour jobs and do not want to get their hands dirty by having "On the floor jobs".

8. Innumerable Taxes and laws for setting up projects.

9. Finally the monster corruption and scams that fends off global investors.

I feel the basic reason behind this lies in the fact on the quality of education which we get, we are following same education system from post independence and this was designed by Britishers who just wanted us to do clerical works for them, so they emphasized on theoretical education which we still follow, right. Till class 10 we had very less or no practical approach to our studies and in many ways in even after.

What we lack is quality technical institutes, yes we do have some of these, but can be counted on fingers when compared to what we actually need.

Like one of my friend said (above) countries like japan, Singapore are doing well despite of their low natural resource, India having enough of it is lacking behind as it is efficient personnel's to utilize them.

Before speaking on the topic, I want to tell you that primary sector (agriculture, fishing etc) , secondary sector (manufacturing) and tertiary sector (services) are the three phases of development of an economy. Generally developing economies are dominated by manufacturing sector, while tertiary sector is the predominant contribution to the development of developed economy. But In case of India, there is a mismatch, India being a developing country is characterized by tertiary sector growth. So it indicates India has skipped the second phase of growth.

From the beginning of nineteenth century up to independence, agriculture was the main livelihood of people and thereafter followed approximately three decades of five-year plan. In this period, growth was minimal. But suddenly after 1990s, and in the beginning of 2000s, IT/ITes/BPO sector developed, because.

- Higher education was in its peak, thus engineering students graduated (increase in manpower).

- Willing to work in less pay.

- Private sectors were true gainers, used Indian skill to transfer knowledge and job to their country, thus getting a support from their respective country.

- For a moment, government thought that it is true development without realizing that the growth comes from outside, and any unexpected circumstance in their country could affect its growth rate.

- Although government launched certain manufacturing policies for development of R&D sector, heavy industries like petroleum and mineral industries, agriculture-allied0industries, still the growth was very minimal due to corruption and lack of interest among the men in power.

But one fundamental theory of manufacturing sector is that, wages and machines that are used to manufacture goods will depreciate, but human assets have their value. Thus it is best time for India to invest in manufacturing now as it has a lot of advantages.

- Large number of skilled and semi-skilled workers available.

- Best brains of India that developed in India are returning to India.

- India is one of world's largest economy, so it does not have to wait for the world to support its investment.

- Many companies have the capacity to invest heavily.

Thus finally, I will conclude that India could not be a world class player in manufacturing sector, but by dedicated and coherent partnership by Govt, public sector and private sector can help India being one of the biggest player in manufacturing.

India has a huge amount of trained manpower and resources. So, the only problem of India being the leading country in manufacturing is its lack of infrastructure and the non-cooperation of the government. A BPO or an IT company merely needs a few computers, few small rooms and huge amount of manpower, not necessarily has to be trained. They could be trained in a month. Whereas manufacturing companies needs small but highly trained manpower, skilled labour, expensive machinaries, Huge infrastructure. So, this requires huge amount of investment.

Lots of hurdles in the Indian government and public sectors discourage high amount of investment to flow in the country. Corruption, inefficiency in every sectors of the government, elongated process time of applications etc. Are the key issues for disinvestment in the country. Indian political leaders and policy makers are also reluctant about manufacturing industries because they may be providing better economic development to the state but the IT companies provide more mediocre, stereotype jobs which is very much necessary to increase the vote-bank. IT companies don't want brains and innovative ideas, they only want a few 'overqualified clerks' to work for them at a 'cheap' rate. So, they outsource their work to developing countries and exploit the young Indian brains leaving them in a 'still developing' country. The only way to enhance Indian Economic and Technological scenario is to stress hardly on manufacturing industries as they can provide the necessary growth for the country.

India could be a Manufacturing Hub in coming Years. As a fact all are aware that India labor force is the world 2nd largest after CHINA. INDIA holds it place in the World's fastest growing economies.

Nowadays, A normal life will be abnormal with out mobile, computers, internet. Everything behind this is TECHNOLOGY. IT gave us power to discover more. Right now it is possible for a 2 Year old kid to see the satellite view of the earth on a click of a mouse button in Google Map/Google Earth. We could talk/video chat to any person in the world with a simple login to SKYPE. No more slips we have carry in our pockets to drop it in bank door steps, you can do all in NETBANKING. Information Technology Era has changed the life of each and every human and as INDIANs we can proudly saw we are participating in the same sector to make life even simpler.

Yes, I accept with the points shared by the friends here, India has gained a mass face for IT/ITES/BPO and other back office processes, but we could also see more Foreign Direct Investments are flowing in for the MANUFACTURING/Mining/Power Generation.

For Ex: Chennai very famous for its IT presence has been witnessing FDI in Manufacturing. Chennai stands @ rank 2 in IT Exports after Bangalore of producing a GDP of 144, 214 crore during 2006-07. After recession Chennai faced JOB LOSSES in history majorly in IT/ITES sector. Later State Govt brought in more employment in Manufacturing, Power Generation[Wind, Solar, Nuclear].

Tamil Nadu state Govt revised the tax benefits and FDI in Manufacturing grown double in recent years, now Chennai is the base to around 30% of India's automobile industry and 40% of its auto components industry. [9] A large number of automotive companies including Hyundai, Renault, Nissan Motors, Ashok Leyland, Daimler AG, Caterpillar Inc. , Komatsu Limited, Ford, BMW and Mitsubishi have manufacturing plants in Chennai.

The Ambattur-Padi industrial zone houses many textile manufacturers, and an SEZ for apparel and footwear manufacture has been set up in the southern suburbs of the city. Chennai contributes more than 50% of India's leather exports.

Telecom and Electronics manufacturers based in and around Chennai include Nokia, Nokia Siemens, Motorola, Dell, Wipro, Zebronics, Foxconn and Siemens among others. Telecom giants Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent, pharmaceuticals giant Pfizer and chemicals giant Dow Chemicals have research and development facilities in Chennai.

Well, how many of you people know that Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu is major gold jewellery manufacturing hubs in India? Each and every DELL Laptop, Samsung LCD TVs manufactured in Chennai are labeled as Made in INDIA and sold across ASIA PACIFIC region.

All these are few fact figures, we have lot more to come in. India is not just for IT/ITES, we have our foot steps already set in for Automobile, Electronics Manufacturing sectors.

All the best. Go India Go!

The reasons behind INDIA'S failure in manufacturing industry:

* I as a student of engineering background much concerned of the CGPA. There is nothing for r&d in my college curriculum. As a student of engineering I study manufacturing and designing of 80's. The syllabus content which is being taught in engineering colleges need to be revised. There should be more focus on technologies (new). Projects should be should be assigned to the students in each sem. So that innovative thinking of the students can be enhanced.

* At least students should try at their basic level to work on innovative ideas. As our president has expressed his concern about the less patents by indians.

India has very very less power generation. Many power plants in India are operating under less efficiency.

For manufacturing sector we need large amount of electricity.

Many micro and medium enterprises in India are running under loss due to lack of interrupted power supply.

Government of India encouraging only big entrepreneurs because they provide employment to large number of persons.

Government provides land at less cost like 10000 per acre for big enterprises.

"small company yesterday becomes medium company today becomes larger tomorrow".

If the government provide land and water resources to talented people without considering any reservations then manufacturing sector in India increases.

I Agree with that India lacks in infrastructure but not with the creative, innovative brains. Corrupted people are just few and the young generations like us are in crore, so stop blaming each other as we & coming generations are in techno world were there is solution for each problem;and start searching for the solutions and not for new country. If we look onto past as well as present India is the only country of self surviving country as developed countries have to depend on export for their basic need i.e. food etc.