SYLLABUS
GS-2: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilization, of resources, growth, development and employment.
Context: Recently, the NITI Aayog has launched a strategic roadmap titled “Reimagining Manufacturing: India’s Roadmap to Global Leadership in Advanced Manufacturing” to position India among the top three global leaders in advanced manufacturing by 2035 through the adoption of frontier technologies.
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- The roadmap targets increasing manufacturing’s share to over 25 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and creating 100 million jobs by 2035.
- It focuses on integrating frontier technologies across 13 priority manufacturing sectors.
- The document has been developed in collaboration with CII and Deloitte with guidance from an expert council.
Key Features of the Roadmap
- The roadmap identifies Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Advanced Materials, Digital Twins and Robotics as core technology enablers for the manufacturing sector.
- It sets a 10-year action plan to improve research and development capacity, upgrade industrial infrastructure and build a skilled workforce.
- It highlights the need for coordinated government and industry efforts to modernise manufacturing operations and reduce dependency on conventional systems.
- It projects that India may lose 270 billion dollars in manufacturing GDP by 2035 if frontier tech adoption is delayed.
- It further warns that the loss could reach 1 trillion dollars by 2047 if reforms remain slow.
- It emphasises that the transition must shift from incremental change to transformational change to achieve Viksit Bharat goals.
- Maharashtra has committed to be the first state to implement the mission at full scale.
The roadmap has been structured in three phases
• Phase 1 (FY2026 – FY2028): Ecosystem Build and Adoption
- Positioning Advanced Manufacturing as a strategic priority under the National Manufacturing Mission (NMM)
- Establishing the Global Frontier Technology Institute (GFTI) in India as a Center of Excellence (CoE)
- Developing a future-ready skilling ecosystem through large-scale, modular, and cluster-aligned programs focused on frontier tech capabilities
- Creating technology access platforms that are inclusive to reduce entry barriers and ensure advanced manufacturing capabilities are widely available across the value chain
- Fostering technology adoption at the enterprise level, driven by champion organisations in advanced manufacturing
- Designing frontier technology-enabled supply chain models across manufacturing clusters and sectors to enable seamless value chain integration and democratized technology access
- Deploying digital and industrial infrastructure to enable the frontier technology ecosystem through the creation of twenty “Plug & Play Frontier Technology enabled Industrial Parks” across India on a combination of states and sectors
Phase 2 (FY2029 – FY2031): Acceleration
- Driving ‘Servicification of Manufacturing’ to transform India’s manufacturing landscape from being a product manufacturer to being a solution provider
Phase 3 (FY2032 – FY2035): Sustenance
- Continuous monitoring of the maturity level of frontier technologies in India and planning for targeted interventions in the future.