India’s Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) schemes have met just 28% of their full-tenure employment target even as they have mobilised 76% of the planned investment, according to NITI Aayog’s first comprehensive assessment of the manufacturing incentive programme, released in New Delhi on 12 November 2026.
The 14 PLI schemes, launched between 2020 and 2021 with tenures ranging from 3 to 10 years, have generated 849,069 jobs by financial year 2025-26, against a target of 30 lakh, the think tank said in its report titled Impact Assessment of PLI Schemes. Investment has reached around ₹2.4 lakh crore of the ₹3.15 lakh crore target, and production has touched ₹22.66 lakh crore, or 64% of the ₹35.38 lakh crore goal. The 14 schemes have collectively completed 578 months of their aggregate 996-month implementation period, or 58% of their combined duration.
Annual employment performance has been uneven. The report said job creation stood at 86% of the target up to 2022-23, around 85% in 2023-24 and 156% in 2024-25, before falling sharply to 31% of the annual target in 2025-26.
“The divergence between cumulative employment and investment and production is important for interpreting the overall performance of the schemes,” the report said, adding that investment typically precedes production and employment as capacity is commissioned and utilisation rises.
NITI Aayog assessed four sectors as being on track across the indicators of investment, production, exports and employment: large-scale electronics manufacturing, pharmaceutical drugs, telecommunications and networking products, and food products. The assessment found that the impact of the bulk drugs PLI scheme on exports, the medical devices scheme on employment, and the Electronics/Technology Products (IT Hardware 2.0) scheme on investments has been weak or partial.
“Overall, the scheme has been successful. We never expected that everyone would perform across all indicators, but 70 per cent of players and indicators are on track,” said Ishtiyaque Ahmed, Programme Director, NITI Aayog. Aayog Chief Executive Officer Anurag Jain, a former Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade secretary, said schemes requiring changes would be reviewed in coordination with the concerned line ministries.
The report said the way forward would involve both sector-specific calibration and a shift beyond the current supply-push design. “A sector-specific understanding of these constraints is necessary so that policy design can move beyond a uniform approach and become more strategically targeted,” it said.
It added: “The scheme in its current form is largely supply-driven. It encourages firms to increase production and build capacity through financial incentives linked to output. While this supply-push approach is important, long-term sustainability also requires strong demand-side support.”
The Aayog said the next generation of PLI schemes would factor in stronger domestic procurement frameworks, export market development, strategic government purchasing and policies that stimulate consumption of domestically produced high-value goods.
