Centre rejigs norms for PLI scheme
The government has replaced the criterion of ‘minimum threshold’ investment with ‘committed’ investment by the selected applicant
Chennai: Making the production-linked incentive schemes more attractive for bulk drugs and medical devices manufacturing, the government has replaced “minimum threshold investment” criterion with “committed investment”.
Issuing detailed guidelines for the schemes, the government has replaced the criterion of ‘minimum threshold’ investment with ‘committed’ investment by the selected applicant. The change has been made to encourage efficient use of productive capital. Further, the amount of investment required to achieve a particular level of production depends upon choice of technology and it also varies from product to product. However, the provision for verification of the actual investment made by the selected applicant for the purpose of giving incentives under the scheme continues.
The government also has deleted the provision which restricts the sales of eligible products to domestic sales only for the purpose of eligibility of receiving incentives for bulk drugs. This brings the scheme in line with other PLI schemes and encourages market diversification. In case of medical devices, eligibility criteria of minimum sales threshold will be in line with projected demand, technology trend and market development for the purpose of availing incentive.
A change in criterion of minimum annual production capacity also has been changed for 10 products, including Tetracycline, Neomycin, Para Amino Phenol (PAP), Meropenem, Artesunate, Losartan, Telmisartan, Acyclovir, Ciprofloxacin and Aspirin.
The tenure of the scheme has been extended by one year keeping in view the capital expenditure expected to be done by the selected applicants in FY 2021-22. Accordingly, the sales for the purpose of availing incentives will be accounted for 5 years starting from FY 2022-2023 instead of FY 2021-2022.
According to the government, it had received suggestions and inputs from the pharmaceutical and medical device industry seeking certain amendments in the scheme to enable effective participation of the industry. The changes have been made based on the suggestions.