The skillsets prod is encouraging: Baba Kalyani

The most reassuring feature of the Finance Minister's speech was his remark, "All engines of the economy are running at full speed." I am particularly happy with the progress made in the area of skill development and the new initiatives announced.

ITIs have already been linked to industry, a public - private partnership is to be forged, a "Knowledge Commission" is to be constituted and most significantly, a special allocation of Rs 100 crores has been provided for the Indian Institute of Science at Bangalore to be made into a world class Research & Development University.

The initiatives that have been announced for the textile, sugar, pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors will greatly contribute towards their improved efficiencies and competitiveness.

I wish the auto component industry had been given similar treatment but perhaps this will be part of next month's Foreign Trade Policy. As far as the auto component industry is concerned, we welcome the extension in the sunset clause under Section 35 (2AB) of the Income Tax Act that provides for weighted deduction of 150% on expenses incurred on R & D.

Notwithstanding the above, we would have been happy if the Budget had contained more initiatives for the manufacturing sector which is poised for high growth and whose competitiveness should be improved.