India’s government expanded the list of smartphone components covered by import duties as part of a broader push to boost domestic device manufacturing.

The Central Bureau of Excise and Customs added a 10 per cent duty on imports of components including camera modules, printed circuit boards (PCBs) and connectors, The Economic Times (ET) reported. The move forms the latest step in the government’s Make in India initiative, which aims to promote home-grown production of mobile phones and their parts.

Imports of items necessary to manufacture such components in India are unaffected by the latest tariff, ET reported.

In a related report, GadgetsNow explained the PCB fee applies to products containing memory chips and other components. Such boards typically account for around half of a smartphone’s bill of materials, it added.

The Make in India initiative involves taxing imports of finished smartphones and a number of specific components integral in handsets. As Mobile World Live reported in December 2017, the government planned to extend the range of imports covered by the rules as part of a phased manufacturing programme – a scheme designed to boost the appeal of locally made products.

Overseas smartphone makers including Xiaomi and Samsung have overtaken Indian manufacturers in the sales charts in what is now the world’s second-largest smartphone market after China. In 2017, Apple petitioned the government for relief against import duties but, like many other non-domestic manufacturers, also moved to produce some devices locally to beat the tariffs.