SME Times News Bureau | 20 Dec, 2011
The government is likely to give Rs. 2,362.15 crore as financial help to nearly 15,000 cooperative societies and 3 lakh individuals involved in the handloom weaving business, Textiles Minister Anand Sharma said Monday.

"To address the critical needs of handloom sector, viz, institutional credit and availability of yearn at reasonable rates, a comprehensive package of Rs.2,362.15 crore for the current financial year 2011-12 and for the 12th plan is under consideration of the cabinet committee on economic affairs," Sharma said in a statement in the Lok Sabha.

The financial package will benefit the cooperative societies and weavers mostly in poll-bound Uttar Pradesh.

Sharma, who is also the minister of commerce and industry, said the government had taken a series of steps to help handloom weavers in the country.

The government has already approved Rs.3,884 crore for loan waiver of cooperative societies and individual handloom weavers.

Sharma said in a bid to make handloom weavers aware about the financial package, 100 awareness camps have been planned during the current financial year in different parts of the country. "A beginning has been made in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Kerala," he said.