Atmanirbhar Bharat is the vision of the Prime Minister of IndiaNarendra Modi of making India a self-reliant nation. The first mention of this came in the form of the 'Atmanirbhar Bharata Abhiyan' or 'Self-Reliant India Mission' during the announcement of the coronavirus pandemic related economic package on 12 May 2020. This self-reliant policy does not aim to be protectionist in nature and as the Finance Minister clarified, "self-reliant India does not mean cutting off from rest of the world". The law and IT minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad, said that self-reliance does "not mean isolating away from the world. Foreign direct investment is welcome, technology is welcome self-reliant India... translates to being a bigger and more important part of the global economy."
Initiatives
As part of the Atmanirbhar Bharat package, numerous government decisions have taken place such as changing the definition of MSMEs, boosting scope for private participation in numerous sectors, increasing FDI in the defence sector; and the vision has found support in many sectors such as the solar manufacturers sector. Examples of initiatives helping Atmanirbhar Bharat:
The growth of India's personal protective equipment sector from zero before March, to 1,50,000 pieces a day by the beginning of May, is considered as a fine example of a self-reliant India. The PPE industry in India has become a in two months, the second largest after China.
The largest fund in the country worth was setup by the IIT Alumni Council with the aim of supporting the mission towards self-reliance.
India's own 'Made in India' 5G network was also announced in July 2020 by Reliance Jio. Mukesh Ambani announced in mid-July "Jio has created a complete 5G solution from scratch, that will enable us to launch a world-class 5G service in India, using 100 per cent homegrown technologies and solutions".
For the first time, in July 2020, it was announced that Apple would manufacturer one of their premium iPhone models in India.
Commentary
Atmanirbhar Bharat has been called by some as a re-packaged version of the Make in India movement using new taglines such as 'Vocal for Local'. Other opposition members spoke about how India had enacted policies and built companies since its creation to make India self-reliant - SAIL for steel production, IITs for domestic engineers, AIIMS for medical science, DRDO for defence research, HAL for aviation, ISRO for space, CCL, NTPC and GAIL in the area of energy; criticizing the advertising tactics. Some have re-phrased it to "Fend For Yourself" Campaign. Also, the calls for India to boycott Chinese products, are practically difficult in the short term for India as India imports $75 billion worth of goods every year from China, to the extent that parts of Indian industry are dependent on China. Following the Galwan Valley skirmish on 15 June 2020 in which around 40 Chinese soldiers and 20 Indian soldiers died, Swadeshi Jagaran Manch said that if the government was serious about making India self-reliant, Chinese companies should not be given projects such as the Delhi-Meerut RRTS.
