New Delhi, Nov 3 (Bureau) The Government has selected 42 companies under the PLI Scheme for White Goods proposed by the Department for Promotion of Industry & Internal Trade (DPIIT) which is the nodal department for this PLI scheme – air conditioners and LED lights sector – with an outlay of Rs 6,238 crores. While 26 selected applicants have committed investments of Rs 3,898 crores for air conditioner manufacturing, 16 companies selected for LED light manufacturing will invest Rs 716 crores. Applications for the scheme were invited from 15 June to 15 September, 2021, with 52 companies filing their application with committed investment of Rs 5,858 crores under the PLI scheme. After evaluation, 42 applicants with committed investment of Rs 4,614 crores have been provisionally selected as beneficiaries under the PLI scheme. The approved investments of Rs 4,614 crores are likely to generate net incremental production of around Rs 81,254 crores and direct employment of about 44,000 people.
The PLI scheme for manufacture of components and sub-assemblies of ACs and LED lights was approved by the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 7 April, 2021. The scheme which is to be implemented over a seven year period, from FY21-22 to FY28-29 was notified by DPIIT on 16 April, 2021 and the guidelines were published on June 4 this year with some modifications issued on 16 August. Applicants were given flexibility to choose the gestation period either up to March 2022 or up to March 2023. Six applicants proposing FDI from countries sharing land border with India have been advised to submit approval for FDI according to the terms of Press Note 3 (2020) issued in April 2020 for consideration of approval under the PLI scheme. Four applicants are being referred to the Committee of Experts (CoE) for examination and its recommendations. The investments in air conditioners will lead to manufacturing components across the complete value chain including components which are not manufactured in India with sufficient quantity.
At present, there is insignificant manufacturing of certain high value components of ACs like compressors, copper tubing and aluminium stock for foils. Many other components like control assemblies for indoor units (IDU) or outdoor units (ODU), display units, brush less direct current motors, valves etc. are not manufactured in enough quantity. All these components will now be manufactured in India in significant quantities. Similarly, LED chip packaging, LED drivers, LED engines, LED light management systems, PCBs including metal clad PCBs and wire wound inductors etc. will be manufactured in India in high quantities.