Karnataka combined with lower manpower costs and the technical know-how has become a base for aerospace sector in the country.

“The State has been attracting global majors to source components and sub-systems from here, as part of their global supply chain for the civil aircraft programmes,” said RV Deshpande, Karnataka Minister for Large & Medium Industries & Infrastructure Development.

Speaking at the Aero India 2017 inaugural ceremony, he said: “Karnataka’s aerospace, which accounts for more than 65 per cent of the country's investment in the sector, stands to benefit the most due to these domestic and global trends.”

“Most importantly, there are scores of aerospace small and medium entrepreneurs (SMEs) present in the State. These companies form the backbone of the sector and without whom Karnataka would not have achieved such stupendous success in aerospace,” he added.

To maintain its aerospace eminence in the country, Deshpande said Karnataka has entered into an agreement with National Aerospace Laboratories, Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd and M S Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences to create the Aerospace Technology Centre.

This ‘Industry-Academia-Government’ partnership in the sector will focus on research, incubation, trainings and certifications will come up in the Bangalore Aerospace Park later this year.

Besides this, an aerospace and aviation sectoral skill council has been established with Chairman, Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd as its Chairman along with 18 other sector specialists as Governing Council members with a mandate to define 90 job roles, certify 5,20,000 trainees and 6,000 qualified instructors over the next 10 years.

He further said, “Karnataka and the aerospace sector are synonymous. Long before the State became known for its achievements in information technology (IT), aerospace, thanks to the presence of PSUs and Defence Research Development Organisations (DRDO), was the ‘bread and butter’ sector for us.”

However, unlike the IT sector which benefited from the economic reforms unleashed in 1991, the aerospace sector had to wait for another 10 years for sectoral reforms.

Realising the long-term potential of aerospace and the spin off benefits it can have on other sectors, “Karnataka has commissioned the country’s first Aerospace Park and Special Economic Zone at Devanahalli, near Bengaluru in 2008. We also constituted an Aerospace Task Force in 2010, which advises the government on all matters of the sector.

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