In lines with the prime ministers ‘make in India campaign’, the department of industrial policy and promotion (light engineering industry division) has identified medical devices in healthcare sector as one among the top five sectors having good investment potential in the domestic as well as export market. Keen on initiating the process, the government has already approached the industry, to gauge the market dynamics and understand their demands and challenges.

Through this proactive process the government aims to bolster the confidence of the industry further by addressing the bottlenecks through active government support. This comes as welcome move for scores of domestic medical devices manufacturers in the country who have been long struggling to get an independent status for the highly potential but not fully explored sector.

Rajiv Nath, president of the Association of Medical Device Industry (AIMED) informed that the industry is positively taken back by such impressive measures taken by the government. “We are happy that the government has finally realised and recognised the importance of this sector and the role it can play in growth of the country. The industry will by all means extend full support to this initiative by sharing our expertise and know how on improving export competitiveness, measures to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) opportunities in medical device sector etc.”

He further informed that the government has also expressed interest in knowing the market, key products and the indigenous manufacturers of these products. “They have also asked us to represent the problems and the challenges we manufacturers are facing in the country including import and export related issues, inverted duty status, Free Trade Agreement (FTA) and the recommendation we have for the same. This is surprising move, a very welcome but surprising move especially since the government started the buck rolling without the industry prodding the matter. We are very excited to finally have found a platform and some kind of independent recognition that may pave way to wider and more elaborate role for the sector in the country,” he added.

The stakeholders’ are expected to send in their representation to the government by mid December. Following which the government may form a task force to take up the matter further. The other four sectors identified by the government are LED lighting products and luminaries, leather and leather products, electric motors and pipes and tubes (seamless pipes).