Deposit 25,000 in bank account of each handloom worker: All India Handloom Rights Forum

Chirala: The Andhra Pradesh unit of the All India Handloom Rights Forum requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi to immediately take remedial measures to save the handloom industry from the crisis due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

In a letter to the Prime Minister, the State secretary of the AIHRF, Bandaru Jwala Narasimham, explained to him that as per 4th All India Handloom Census 2019-20, the total number of households in India engaged in handloom activities (weaving and allied activities) is 31.45 lakh and 72% among them were females.

He said that 95.6 per cent of the handlooms were fixed in household and 66.3 per cent of these households earn less than Rs 5,000 per month. He announced that the forum trusts that if the handloom sector was also given the same encouragement that the power-loom sector has been receiving, it has the potential to become next to the agriculture sector in sorting out the unemployment problem to a very large extent in India. Narasimham informed the Prime Minister that the genuine handloom workers do not know even some of the names of the welfare schemes, as the benefits of the schemes are being given to the cooperative societies, in which 90 per cent are fake and corrupt. He requested the Prime Minister to conduct an inquiry into the functioning of the societies where there are neither looms nor production and take necessary action so that all the welfare schemes and policies reach the genuine handloom weavers and workers only.

The AIHRF State secretary requested Narendra Modi to protect the handloom industry and extend support to the handloom workers during and after the Covid-19 pandemic by releasing Rs 25,000 directly into the accounts of the handloom workers whose families are severely hit due to the lockdown.

Narasimham asked the Prime Minister to directly provide hank-yarn, silk, zari, wool and raw materials to the handloom workers with 75% subsidy through NHDC and exempt GST on raw materials. He urged the Centre to purchase the handloom products from the weavers and private master weavers, provide a life insurance cover of Rs 25 lakh to the weavers and increase the approved loan amount to Rs 10 lakh under Mudra scheme.