Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the Union Budget 2022 on Tuesday and experts have urged her to look into specific aspects of the telecom sector which has been facing various challenges.
“India is at a point of inflection in leveraging tech. The last two years have demonstrated the resilience of the sector. While the services-led export story continues to be very strong, the tech industry needs to now deal with the emerging challenges with new operating, and emerging demands of talent and skills. On the other hand, we have the massive opportunity to address the informal economy, the self-employed, the SMBs and the underserved ‘Bharat’ through tech and platforms which can create a massive virtuous cycle that can drive real transformation. In addition, 5G in telco, digital media and manufacturing are other big themes that are playing out which will all require support and enabling policy framework to ensure this sector continues to play a pivotal role in India’s transformation story”, said Vikash Jain, Managing Director and Senior Partner, Boston Consulting Group.
“With several reforms being announced in the telecom sector, there is indeed an interest on how the budgetary allocations will follow these reforms. There is a need for budgetary allocations for the development of 5G technology including equipment. Further, the spectrum auction possibly to be held during this year is likely to also open up the satellite services sector, which already has a lot of focus basis the SpaceCom Policy, hence the investment onto space technology along with equipment manufacturing in this space may be an area that is likely to have a focus in the budget as well. It is also likely that the issues relating to the sale of BSNL and MTNL may be a point of contention, given that the revival plans haven’t really worked well, and they having not migrated their technologies, in spite of access to spectrum,” said Tony Verghese, Partner, J Sagar Associates (JSA).
With inputs from Live Mint
