FM Sitharaman touts Made-in-India potential for ‘the world’; Highlights Aadhaar, UPI, DigiLocker, ONDC initiatives | Today’s news
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who also serves as the 32nd Corporate Affairs Minister, addressed leading investors and business leaders in Chicago during a high-level business roundtable. She discussed opportunities in manufacturing, artificial intelligence and digital technology, financial services, infrastructure, food processing, defense and advanced technology, ANI reported.
Suggesting that Made in India was a central theme of the discussions, the Finance Ministry said on X: “The key focus of the meeting was ‘Manufacturing in India – for India and for the world’ with opportunities in manufacturing, AI and digital, financial services, infrastructure, food processing, defense and advanced technology.”
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Touting the proposal to manufacture in India, both for domestic requirements and for global export markets, the finance minister argued that India represents significant scale along with long-term operational depth that at a time when international corporations are rethinking global supply chains and capital allocation strategies
FM Sitharaman welcomes Aadhaar, UPI, DigiLocker initiatives
During her address to international investors, the finance minister said, “Digital public infrastructure – including Aadhaar, UPI, DigiLocker, ONDC and India Stack – have created platforms at population scale. She even underlined the expansion of GIFT IFSC as an international hub that connects global capital with domestic enterprises.”
With Global Capability Centers across the country that have evolved into global innovation hubs, it has unveiled expectations for the next phase – building high-value operations in artificial intelligence, analytics, engineering, semiconductors and electronics.
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She highlighted a combination of factors driving India’s economic appeal, including strong domestic demand, investment-led expansion, macroeconomic resilience, a vast talent pool and expanding physical and digital infrastructure.
It called for greater participation from global partners and appealed for emphasis on the convergence of scale, growth, talent, infrastructure, technology and sustained reforms over the past decade. It encouraged firms to view India as an integrated manufacturing base, innovation hub and destination for long-term capital investment, and sought joint development and co-production to build for global markets.
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To expand the nation’s infrastructure, she emphasized the growth of freight corridors, rail modernization and electrification, all of which continue to open avenues for institutional capital through platforms such as the National Investment and Infrastructure Fund. She even pointed to policy measures such as the Production Linked Incentive scheme, which enabled a shift from basic assembly to deeper manufacturing of components, engineering and advanced technologies.
Apart from noting opportunities in agro-processing, Sitharaman pointed out that India’s investment proposition rests on several sectors such as convergence of scale, growth, talent, infrastructure, technology and sustained reforms over the last decade.
