India must urgently shift from a services-heavy growth model to a product-led manufacturing economy if it wants to secure long-term economic leadership, Bharat Forge Chairman and Managing Director Baba Kalyani said at the Public Policy Festival 2026 in Pune.
“We must become a product nation rather than remain a service nation,” Kalyani asserted. “For too long, we have been focused on services. We need to learn how to create products. If we continue to serve foreign companies or multinational corporations, India will not progress.”
He pointed out that manufacturing currently contributes only about 13 per cent to India’s GDP, down from 15 per cent earlier, and said this share must rise to 25 per cent to unlock sustainable growth, jobs, and export competitiveness.
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According to Kalyani, the country’s comfort with service outsourcing and tax incentives has limited genuine innovation, even though Indian IT companies are globally successful.
Kalyani said Bharat Forge itself has transformed from a traditional forging company into a diversified manufacturing powerhouse supplying high-value products for electronics, defence, and unmanned systems.
The company works with global automotive OEMs, including Daimler-Benz, Toyota, Honda, Volvo, Scania, Ford, General Motors and MAN, and also supplies turbine blades and shafts to Rolls-Royce and landing gear components to Airbus. He noted that German and Japanese companies are now trying to catch up in segments where Bharat Forge has built strong product capabilities.
Calling for faster execution on the ground, Kalyani endorsed Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu’s focus on “speed of doing business”, citing how his group received 1,000 acres for a major facility in the state within just 15 days. He said such decisive governance is critical for India’s manufacturing revival.
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