A few slums are seen along the road on the Delhi-Haryana border. About two dozen families of nomadic tribes live in these slums. Mahendra and his family are also one of them. All these people sell toys. A traffic signal made nearby is the workplace of these people.
The signal which is on the signal indicates the traffic to stop as soon as the light is red, the same red light is a sign of starting work for these people. The longer the vehicles stop at the red signal, the more time Mahendra and his family get to convince the people sitting in the car to buy toys.
Mahendra's six-year-old son, who is his age playing with toys, also helps his father sell toys by running barefoot in the scorching sun. The sale of these toys gives livelihood to Mahendra's family and makes them self-sufficient.
But these are not the toys with which Prime Minister Modi has spoken in his radio program 'Mann Ki Baat' recently. Rather, they are toys from China which have a tremendous influence on the Indian market.
Mahendra does not know where the toys he sells are produced. They do not know what the Prime Minister has said in Mann Ki Baat to make the country self-sufficient. They do not even know if there is any radio program like Mann Ki Baat or any plan like self-sufficient India. They only know that these toys are available at wholesale prices in Sadar Bazar of Old Delhi and selling them on the street feeds their family.
Delhi's Sadar Bazaar is one of the largest wholesale markets in Asia. The Teliwada region of this market is famous for the wholesale trade of toys. There are not only toy wholesalers here but also many producers and importers from whom traders from every corner of the country reach here to buy toys.
They also have big shopkeepers and small hawkers like Mahendra. Prime Minister Modi has talked about promoting Indian toys in the recent episode of his 'Mann Ki Baat' program, even though people like Mahendra may not be aware of it, it has started to force on the foreheads of the traders of Sadar Bazar.
That is because of the toy market in India, about 80 percent of the toys imported from China are accounted for. Puneet Suri, who has been in the wholesale trade of toys in the Sadar Bazaar for the past several years, says, "Indian toys are currently no match with China's toys." Chinese toys are much better than our toys in quality and much lower in price. By the way, if toys start being made in India, then we will be happy to sell Indian goods. '
According to the Toy Association of India, toys worth about four thousand crore rupees are imported from China every year in India. If the market value of these toys is seen, then it increases up to three times, so the total trade of toys from China becomes about 12 thousand crores.
While talking about Indian toys, their total business is not even worth a thousand crores. The Modi government has made some efforts in the past years to reduce this domination of China in the toy market. However, all these attempts failed and each time Indian traders suffered.
Ramit Sethi, owner of 'Mile Stone Ipex' company, says, "In 2017, this government brought new rules of certification. Due to this, merchants like us had to bear an additional cost of one lakh rupees on almost every product. Then the government increased the import duty on toys imported from China from 20 percent to 60 percent directly.
The burden of this import duty also increased three times on the importer like us because the goods we take from China have no option in India. Not only toys, almost every merchandise in electronics is coming from China. Leaders who make an air speech say about the Boycott of China, first of all, they should break their mic so that they are giving the speech because that too belongs to China. '
This resentment from the current government is that of almost all toy traders like Ramit Sethi. Ajay Kumar of Sindhwani Brothers, who have been trading toys since 1951, says, "The toy trade was first affected in the 90s, when liberal policies were adopted and foreign toys started coming into Indian markets rapidly." After this, the biggest loss in this business has occurred during this government. '
Ajay says that the first demonetization caused a big blow to the toy trade. Demonetisation took place in November when the soft toy season begins and lasts until Valentine. The entire season was killed that year. Then GST raised the tax on toys from 12% to 12% and for electronic toys to 18%. After that, the import duty on toys was increased by 200% and now the BIS certification is going to break the back of toy traders. ”BIS i.e. 'Bureau of Indian Standards'.
This is a certification, which is proving to be a new problem for Indian toy traders. The Modi government has decided to make BIS certification mandatory for all toys sold in the country. This decision not only bothers those merchants who import toys from China, but also traders who produce toys in India are unhappy.
Krishna Kumar Pahwa, owner of KK Plastics, says, "On one hand, Modi Ji talks about increasing Indian toys and Indian traders and on the other hand he is trying to break the back of traders by imposing conditions like BIS." Toys are mostly small traders in India. It is not possible for them to fulfill the terms of BIS, because every merchant will have to build a separate lab for this.
Indian toy factories run in very small places, where will the lab space come out of them and even small traders will not be able to afford it. 'The central government had made the BIS certification mandatory for toy traders from this one September. However, due to heavy opposition from the traders, it has been postponed for a month.
Toy traders are also opposing this because it will greatly increase the cost of toys. At the same time, he also has a question that why this certification is being implemented only for toys, why not other products?
Indian producers complain that the government has not taken any step in the past years to promote Indian toys. If this had happened, China's hold on the Indian market could have been weakened. But, without strengthening their hold, Indian traders are facing the loss of stopping or making imports difficult from China. BIS is also being considered as a step that is hurting Indian businessmen rather than harming China.
Karthik Jain, owner of 'Innocent Playmates Pvt Ltd', which has been trading toys in India since 1942, says, "The intent behind BIS may be good." Who wouldn't want toys to be safe? But BIS should not be implemented in a hurry like the rest of the decisions of this government. From demonetization to GST, everyone had good intentions but they have all done damage. The same is seen in the case of BIS. Implementing in this hurry will force many small traders to leave this business. '
Karthik Jain suspects BIS to be implemented in such a way, saying, 'It is also an amazing coincidence that last year, Mukesh Ambani's company Reliance Retail bought the popular brand of toys, Hemlej, and since then such policies have been made. It seemed that it became very difficult for the rest to remain in the toy trade. The same coincidence also happened in Telecom. When Ambani came, it became difficult for anyone to stay with Airtel, Vodafone.
Hemley is a UK multinational company which is also considered to be the oldest and largest toy company in the world. In May 2019, Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Retail bought it for Rs 620 crore. Ramit Sethi says, whatever toys Hemlej is making, they are all made from Chinese goods. If Ambani Ji has bought Hemlej, then the goods of China will not become indigenous.
Mukesh Ambani's entry into the toy business, the imposition of BIS conditions on toys, and the Prime Minister referring to the toy trade in 'Mann Ki Baat', suspecting their co-existence as anonymity of a businessman associated with the Toy Association "India has a huge toy market and China sells over 80 percent of it," he says. In such a market, there is scope for big businessmen like Ambani to form a monopoly with the help of the government.
The government's decisions are also indicating that the whole game of toy trade is being done at the behest of a man. "Prime Minister Modi said that the promotion of Indian toys in 'Mann Ki Baat' made Indian producers happy. Why not? In response to this question, Anil Taneja, who has been making Indian toys for the past 25 years, says, "There is a lot of difference between Modi's words and actions.
They say to increase us, but their decisions are going to make us fall. There is no such plan for the future that Indian toy producers are seeing any relief or boost. In the remaining 'Mann ki Baat' it is a different matter to say anything. Modi Ji is good at speaking.
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