India, July 24 -- In 2025, India's smartphone exports crossed a threshold that should change how India thinks about industrial policy. With exports of about Rs.2.6 lakh crore, the smartphone became the country's largest exported product category, ahead of diesel fuel and cut diamonds. A decade earlier, India was overwhelmingly an importer of handsets.

Recently, the Union Cabinet approved the Rs.62,000-crore Mobile Phone Manufacturing Scheme, and Semicon 2.0 with an outlay of Rs.1.3 lakh crore. The two initiatives demonstrate the next stage of a deliberate climb, from assembly to component manufacturing, design, intellectual and property creation, resulting in globally competitive Indian firms.

The mobile-phone experience shows what disc...