Make in India: Every fourth iPhone used worldwide is now made in India. As great an achievement as this seems, a section of the foreign media is looking at it from a different perspective. Recently Bloomberg questioned India’s mobile manufacturing model in one of its reports. Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnav himself took charge after this report came out. Through live statistics on social media, he revealed how the government’s policies have contributed immensely to the country’s exchequer and employment of common people.

Bloomberg has raised questions about iPhone manufacturing

The controversy started with a Bloomberg news. Citing an article by journalist Andy Mukherjee, the report said that today one in four iPhones in the world is made in India. But it was also claimed that this success is not as easy as it seems due to heavy government subsidies and expensive imported parts. The report tried to illustrate that copying China’s manufacturing model would not prove to be a profitable deal for India, giving examples of different iPhone parts.

Mobile PLI figures are as follows: Government Incentive Paid: Rs. 19,000 crore. Direct Tax Collection: Rs. 25,000 crores. GST Collected: Rs. 3,00,000 crores. Electronics manufacturing employs 25 lakh people; Mobile manufacturing alone employs 12 lakhs.

Hard faced !!

— Ashwini Vaishnaw (@AshwiniVaishnaw) October 27, 2026

Ashwini Vaishnav kept an account of earnings in lieu of government subsidy

Amid the foreign media’s discussion of this claim, Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnav put forward the official figures of the Mobile PLI scheme. Vaishnav explained the full math of government subsidies that were being called expensive in the Bloomberg report. According to data shared by him, the government has so far given incentives or subsidies worth Rs 19,000 crore to companies under the Mobile PLI scheme.

If we look at this one figure alone, this amount may seem huge. But the money that came to the government treasury in return is many times more than this. Ashwini Vaishnav said that the government will spend Rs. 25,000 crores in direct tax has been collected. The matter does not end here. The government has received a huge tax of Rs 3,00,000 crore in the form of GST. That is, by spending Rs 19 thousand crore, the government recovered more than it spent through direct tax alone, while Rs 3 lakh crore was received from GST separately.

The mobile sector has become a source of livelihood for millions of people

The success of any government scheme is not only determined by the tax figures, but also by the number of houses released by it. While the Bloomberg report only talked about subsidy spending, Ashwini Vaishnav also showed the other side of the picture by providing employment figures.

According to the statistics given by the minister, the electronics manufacturing sector of the country has provided employment to a total of 25 lakh people. The largest share of this is from mobile phone manufacturing companies. The mobile manufacturing sector alone has provided employment to 12 lakh people. This means that almost half of the total employment in the electronics sector is generated by mobile manufacturing alone.