SME Times News Bureau | 15 Aug, 2019
Sixteen State Governments signed MoU with Ministry of
Textiles at a function in New Delhi today to take Samarth - Scheme for Capacity Building in Textile Sector (SCBTS)
forward.
Eighteen States have agreed to partner with the Ministry under
the scheme out of which Jammu & Kashmir and Odisha were not present during the
function on Thursday.
Initially, the Ministry has allocated over 3.5 lakh targets
to the agencies nominated by State Governments to implement this scheme. After
the training employment will be provided to all these beneficiaries in various
textiles related activities.
The programme covers the entire value chain of the textiles
sector except spinning and weaving.
The training programme involves advanced technology oriented
features like Aadhaar Based Biometric Attendance System (AEBAS), CCTV
recording, dedicated Call Centre, Mobile App based Management Information
System and on-line monitoring.
Speaking on the occasion, Union Minister of Textiles and Women
and Child Development, ZubinIrani, said that the signing of MoUs with State
Governments shows the commitment of the Ministry to extend its support to the
state agency and make them equal partners for building the spirit of national
development to boost the textiles sector.
Irani further said that the targets set out by some of the
States like Tamil Nadu and Jharkhand are much below the requirement of skilled
workers in textiles industry in those states and urged them to relook at the
targets.
She said that the Ministry will try to ensure that those who
are not employed by the industry may get additional benefits provided by
financial services under Mudra scheme. She said that the resolve to skill over
4 lakh people is a big step and every effort must be made to achieve it.
The Minister said that she will be visiting the training
facilities in different states to take stock of the situation.
She also said that 75% of the workers engaged in the textiles
sector and 70% of the beneficiaries of the Mudra loan are women. She further
added that North Eastern States must focus on silk and jute sector and review
the targets of skilling under Samarth scheme.
Secretary Textiles, Ravi Capoor, in his address said that
India is a very small player in the global market and there is huge potential
of employment generation in the textiles sector.
Secretary Textiles informed that there is a gap of 16 lakh
trained skilled workers in textiles industry.
He further added that high standards have been set out in
theSamarth scheme for the skilling of the workers so that they are readily
employable by the industry. He said that the level of training has to be very
good so that the objective of providing meaningful employment to the skilled
workers is fulfilled.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s message on skill development
under Samarth scheme was read out during the function. A short video film
on the scheme was screened on the occasion. A souvenir was also released during
the function.
The Ministry of Textiles, as part of the Government’s broad
focus on skill development, implemented the flagship scheme (2010 to 2017) of
skilling in textiles sector, Integrated Skill Development Scheme with a target
to provide 15 lakh additional skilled workers to the textiles sector by 2017.
Under the scheme 11.14 lakh persons were trained by March,
2018 and 8.41 lakh persons were provided placement.
With a view to leverage the institutional capability created
by the Ministry and the synergy / collaboration achieved with the industry and
the state governments, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs gave its
approval for a new skill development scheme, titled “Samarth” - Scheme for Capacity Building in Textile Sector (SCBTS)"
from 2017-18 to 2019-20.
It is a placement oriented programme for meeting the skill
requirements of textiles industry.
The scheme aims at skill development of 10 lakh youth upto
2020 in the entire value chain of textiles, excluding spinning and weaving in
the organized sector, with a projected outlay of Rs. 1300 crore.