Ludhiana, Mar 7 (KNN) The auto parts manufacturing industry of Ludhiana has urged the Punjab government to set up a facility centre, provide freight subsidy scheme besides scrapping of professional tax and lowering power rates, according to a report in TOI.

Gurpargat Singh Kahlon, president, Auto Parts Manufacturers Association (APMA), said, “The auto parts industry of Ludhiana is one of the biggest contributors of GST in the micro and small segment. But even then, we are miserably lagging behind auto parts manufacturers of other states in terms of quality because of which they are slowly making good gains over us.”

“The Punjab government in the upcoming budget should announce a common facility centre for the industry. Such a centre should be equipped with the latest CNC machines using which we can bring down the cost of production by getting various processes done from these machines,” he said.

One of the major problem faced by the auto parts industry is due to the far-off locations of steel plants (located in other states).

“The raw material costs us more than our counterparts in other states because of additional freight cost. We urge the state government to introduce freight subsidy scheme in the upcoming budget, under which 20 per cent of the freight incurred on purchasing raw material should be reimbursed to us which will provide a level playing field to the engineering industry that is otherwise facing huge competition from outside Punjab,” said Baljeet Singh Vishvakarma, auto parts manufacturer.

Nitin Sharma, another auto parts manufacturer, said, “Our industry’s biggest demand is scrapping of Punjab state development tax (or professional tax) in this budget.”

CM Bhagwant Mann's government will present its Budget for financial year 2023-24 on March 10 as the Budget session of the 16th Punjab Assembly will be held from March 3 to March 24.  (KNN Bureau)