India targets tech resilience, not self-sufficiency, with 20-25-year roadmap, Ashwini Vaishnaw says

Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on 14 October that India is planning over a 20-25 year horizon to reduce critical technology dependencies and strengthen its ability to withstand global disruptions.

The minister for railways, information and broadcasting, electronics and information technology also emphasised that the country aims to become a trusted partner across global technology supply chains rather than pursue complete self-sufficiency.

“Things change, politics change, geopolitics play a big role, so we have to constantly calibrate our approach, and we in India are thinking at least 20 years ahead,” Vaishnaw said speaking at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in the national cpaital on Wednesday. The three-day forum is being organized by Bloomberg Media Group, a division of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News.

The discussion also featured Cisco Chairman and CEO Chuck Robbins, who said India’s scale and approach of building strategically important capabilities while partnering with trusted companies offered a practical path towards technology sovereignty.

Vaishnaw said India was identifying areas where dependence on other countries could leave its production and economy vulnerable to changing policies and geopolitical tensions.

Focus on building domestic capabilities: Vaishnaw

The minister said India was setting short-term goals for three to five years, medium-term targets for five to 15 years and long-term goals spanning 20 to 25 years. He added that the focus was on building domestic capabilities in strategically important areas while remaining integrated with global value chains.

Vaishnaw said technology would continue to be a global industry, with supply chains spanning multiple countries. The priority, he said, was to identify strategic dependencies and ensure that partnerships did not compromise India's resilience.

He highlighted the need to develop the full semiconductor ecosystem, including materials, chemicals, gases and substrate materials, alongside chip design and manufacturing. India’s second phase of the semiconductor programme places greater emphasis on these inputs, he said, adding that building such capabilities required time and sustained effort.

“Without ecosystem, no manufacturing effort will ever pay off,” Vaishnaw said, citing the mobile phone industry as an example of India’s gradual move from assembly to modules and components. He said India was now manufacturing many components needed domestically and had begun exporting some to other countries.

The minister also acknowledged the need to increase research and development spending and improve how it is directed, particularly towards applied research.

India’s end-to-end 4G telecom stack

He cited the development of India’s end-to-end 4G telecom stack through government-private sector collaboration in three-and-a-half years. The system “is deployed on more than 100,000 towers,” he said.

Vaishnaw also flagged risks from future global financial and technological disruptions, including the effects of artificial intelligence on employment and pressure from debt levels in advanced economies.

“It's going to bring in a much bigger turbulence because by that time AI would have brought in many other disruptions in the employment sector, in the way people, especially the services industries, the way they work, and the debt levels getting unravelled. All those things are going to be extremely difficult times ahead,” he said.

“Without ecosystem, no manufacturing effort will ever pay off,” Vaishnaw said.

The minister also said India was preparing to strengthen its financial, economic and technological resilience, noting that its public debt-to-GDP ratio had declined from 61 per cent to 55 per cent over the past five years.

(With ANI inputs)

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