Mumbai, March 8, 2017
Union Minister for Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises Shri Kalraj Mishra informed today in Mumbai that the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Programme of Ministry of MSME has a major tool for generating employment opportunities in urban and rural areas.
He also said that Khadi is a pre-dominantly women oriented sector and 80 – 90% of the artisans are women , since inception till today about 4 lakh micro enterprises has been set up under the PMEGP scheme providing employment opportunities to 34.96 lakhs persons. He also briefed on online system under PMEGP for transparency and to accelerate the pace of implementation.
The main focus of the Khadi & Village Industry Sector is to bring in betterment and improve wage conditions of the Khadi artisans. KVIC in the recent Commission meeting proposed to enhance spinning wages from Rs. 5.50 per hank to Rs. 7 per hank which will to provide around Rs. 200 per day (8 hrs working) to the Khadi spinner.
He narrated that Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi’s call through ‘Man Ki Baat’ for buying atleast one item of Khadi by the Countrymen has generated a great response.
The Khadi Reform Development Package is an important support provided for Capacity Building of Khadi institutions through assistance of ADB. KRDP scheme is intended to develop the overall infrastructure and production capabilities of Khadi Institutions including IT-MIS, sales outlets renovation, khadi product design and development etc.
The Minister assure that Government is very serious about KVI sector since it is the only sector which can provide employment at a very low capital investment. Khadi can provide employment at very low capital investment as low as Rs. 13500/-. Similarly employment under Village Industry involves minimum capital investment of Rs. One lakh.
Shri Mishra also announced that the DSOs of KVIC will be offering a special 5% discount to women to celebrate women empowerment from today for one week.