Bangalore: The Telecom Equipment Manufacturers Association of India (TEMA) today (July 16, 2004) slammed the Government for adopting policies in the telecom sector, which it said aided multinational companies and sounded the "death knell" for domestic manufacturers.

"The Government's policies clearly favour MNC's instead of promoting domestic manufacturers. We are not seeking protection, but asking them to promote indigenous technology which is superior to those of the MNC's," TEMA President N K Goyal told in Bangalore at the launch of India Broadband Forum, a forum of broadband technology players.

Severely critical of the Budget proposals, TEMA members said Finance Minister P Chidambaram had provided total duty exemption on finished electronic and telecom goods, while retaining the 12 per cent duty on components.

"This gives unfair advantage to MNCs who can dump their products in India at costs lower than at what can be produced here. We are at a disadvantage due to the duties on component imports," Krone Communications Managing Director Bala Chandran said.

He said even the procurement policies of the state-run BSNL and MTNL were biased in favour of MNCs, which stipulated that any technology to be deployed by the PSU telecom firms should have been proven in two foreign countries.

"We (the domestic industry) have been discriminated by the public sector telecom firms," Shyam Telecom Managing Director Arun Khanna said.