, Columnist
Make in India? It Will Take More Than Subsidies
The central government needs to give investors in export industries the freedom to decide where and how they operate, not just money.
Thumb on the scales?
Photographer: T. Narayan/Bloomberg
This article is for subscribers only.
Last week, while inaugurating a new aircraft factory in western India, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi returned to a slogan he coined a few months after taking power in 2014: “Make in India.” This time, however, he added: “Make for the world.”
This isn’t the first time Modi has gestured toward India’s need to increase manufacturing exports. Still, the rhetorical emphasis is welcome, given that India’s pitch to investors has typically focused on the size of its domestic market rather than on how easy it is to set up shop and export from the country.