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| Powerloom Machine |
The Maharashtra
Government, led by the Bhartiya Janata Party or the BJP has recently announced
the provision of subsidy to owners of textile mills that wouldn’t be linked to
bank loans. In what can be denoted a first-time move by the government, the
textile industry on the whole would gain immense benefits. This has come to be
of major relief to the large majority of Muslim powerloom owners, who had been
demanding this delinking for a long time now. These Muslim powerloom owners,
along with a large number of workers had always felt that the usury as well as
the bank loans were against their religion, considering the fact that Islam
does not allow the practise of taking or giving loans.
Earlier, this
subsidy was credit linked, and to benefit from the same the textile owners
needed to avail a bank loan. It was for this very reason that a large number of
mill owners and weavers refrained from modernising their production units.
It was under a
policy decision that the government declared the grant of capital subsidy that
would be delinked from bank loans, wherein cotton ginning mills, spinning
mills, printing and processing units will be given a subsidy amounting to 35%.
Similarly. The composite and technical textile units will receive a subsidy of
30%, while the powerlooms along with other related units will receive that of 25%.
Moreover, the owners of power looms from the northern parts of the state
including Vidarbha and Marathwada will receive an additional subsidy of 10%.
The Founder-Secretary
of Malegaon Industries & Manufacturers Association (MIMA), Mr.Aleem Faizee,
expressed his approval on the decision stating that this is a welcome move and has
been long awaited. He also pointed out that this proposal was even sent to the
centre but to no avail. According to him, this move will give the much needed
boost to the textile industry. Textiles is notably the second largest
employment sector of the nation, next only to agriculture. There are over
twenty four lakh power looms across India, of which almost half are in
Mahrashtra in the areas of Bhiwandi, Malegaon and Dhule. An astonishing fact is
that 90% of the owners as well as workers of these factories are Muslims. And
as per the Islmaic Law, Muslims are neither allowed to take or pay any
interest, and hence the power loom owners had always refrained from taking up
the prevalent scheme.
Close to Rs. 75
thousand crores have been spent under the Textile Upgradation Fund Scheme
(TUFS), over the last 14 years, in order to modernize the textile industry of
the nation (SELL & BUY Textile products Online), and raise the standards of the same, to meet the global standards.
This scheme had been initiated to extend benefits to various sector within the
textile industry such as spinning and weaving along with garments. However, the
benefits of this policy were all limited by the fact that the owners required
the power loom owner to take a bank loan. This limitation did not let the
industry boom, and the off-take under TUFS was registered to be as low as two
percent. The textile ministry has accepted this flaw of the policy, also
agreeing to the fact that most of the prevalent looms are fast becoming
obsolete, due to their high level of energy consumption.
With the new changes in the policy, it is believed
that a large majority of power loom owners would now be able to reap the
benefits of the delinking of the subsidy from bank loans, thus triggering the
much needed modernisation of the set ups across the industry! If this scheme
shows positive results, it should be replicated Nationwide as it will benefit
the powerloom sector in different parts of India which will in turn bring more
business and employment to the textile sector.
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