Handloom and Textiles in Bangaru Telangana

Handloom industry occupies a unique place in the country for its exclusive arts and artefacts’ of handloom weavers. Ethnic handloom design of Telangana state has been promoting the cultural glory of the State over the years. The design pattern of Pochampally Ikat’s, Gadwala cotton, Silk and Sico sarees, Narayanpet cotton, Silk sarees, Warangal durries, Karimnagar bed sheets and furnishing shows the outstanding skills of handloom weavers of the State. A significant portion of State workforce is dependent on handloom industry for employment.

Table: Handloom and Textiles at a glance

Handloom Co-operative Societies	Number
Cotton	259
Silk Weaver Cooperative Societies (WCSs)	33
Wool ICSs	44
Power loom WCSs	157
Tailor CSSs/ Garments CSs	122
Total	615
Handloom Weaver in Cooperative folds	82435
Handloom Weaver outside Cooperative folds	32002
Identity cards issued to the weaver under Cooperative folds	23100
Identity cards issued to the weaver outside Cooperative folds	17839
Number of Power looms	49112

In order to resolve the problems faced by the handloom weavers and for their socio-economic development, Government is implementing several schemes such as credit support, health insurance, market support etc.

Some of the important programmes are illustrated below:

(i) Marketing Support Scheme: In order to enable the weaver cooperatives to sell their products, 11 expos have been conducted and sold stock worth Rs 6.45 lakh in 2014-15.

(ii) Health Insurance Scheme: A new scheme 'Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana' is proposed to implement on the lines of health Insurance scheme to 24,148 weavers from 01.10.2014.

(iii) 20% price Subsidy on Hank Yarn, Dyes & Chemicals: 10% price subsidy on hank yarn, dyes and chemicals are being provided to the handloom weavers’ cooperative societies.

Loan Waiver Scheme: Government has implemented loan waiver scheme to individual handloom weavers/ Weavers cooperative societies and released an amount of Rs 48.56 crores. Working capital loans and government loans pertaining to 163 weavers cooperative societies worth of Rs 33.46 crore were waived benefiting 58,014 weavers. Individual loans worth of Rs. 15.1 crore to 7540 handloom weavers was waived off.

V. Power loom Industry

There are 49,112 tower looms in the State, spread over Karimnagar, Warangal, Khammam, Nalgonda, Rangareddy and Mahabubnagar districts. Out of total power looms, 38,000 are working in Siriclla Town alone. Most of these looms are 56 width producing low-end varieties. Following are some of the initiatives of the Government to support the power loom industry:

(i) Up-gradation of Plain Powerlooms: As the power looms in Siriclla are outdated, Government of India selected Siriclla area under pilot project scheme of In-Situ Up-gradation of Plain Powerlooms. As many as 2000 power looms were upgraded with the assistance of Government of India, Government of Telangana and beneficiary contribution.

(ii) 50% Power Tariff concession to Powerloom Weavers: The State Government has been giving 50% power subsidy to the power loom weavers for the power loom units up to 5 HP. Under the scheme, 10,000 Powerloom units were benefited and Rs 2555.15 lakhs were released to TRANSCO for the year 2014-15.

(iii) 50% Power subsidy to Textile Park at Siriclla: 50% power subsidy to the Textile park at Sircilla is being provided by the State Government. About Rs. 7.19 crore have been released during 2015-16 towards this purpose benefiting 108 units during 01.01.2010 to 31.12.2014.

Institutional Credit to Micro and Small Enterprises: As part of Annual Credit Plan for Telangana State, 2014-15 a total of Rs. 6,588 crore was allocated for financing micro and small industries in Telangana. As against this a total of Rs. 13,330 crore were disbursed by Commercial Banks in 2014-15 almost doubling the target.

MSME sector performs a critical role in manufacturing and value chains. Recognizing its importance Government of Telangana is providing various incentives to MSME sector. Major incentives being offered to Micro and Small Enterprises as a part of T-IDEA scheme are:

• 100 percent reimbursement of Stamp duty on purchase of land or lease of land/shed/ buildings,

• 25 percent rebate in land cost (limited to Rs.10 lakh),

• fixed power cost reimbursement @ Rs. 1 per unit for 5 years,

• 15 percent investment subsidy on fixed capital investment (a maximum of Rs.20 lakh),

• reimbursement of 100 percent net VAT/CST or State Goods and Services Tax (SGST) for a period of 5 years, interest subsidy under Pavala Vaddi Scheme etc.

• Interest subsidy under Pavala Vaddi Scheme on the term loan was taken on the fixed capital investment

• 50% Reimbursement of the cost involved in skill up gradation and training the local manpower limited to Rs.2000 per person.

• 50% subsidy on the expenses incurred for quality certification / patent registration limited to Rs. 2.00 Lakhs.

• 25% subsidy on specific cleaner production measures limited to Rs.5.00 Lakhs.

The government is also creating a congenial and hassle-free environment to help small scale industries to acquire new technologies and skills, improve export performance, promote linkage between large and small sector.

G.Rajendera Kumar