In order to ensure that the benefits of government schemes reach genuine weavers, the State government has decided to take up the geo-tagging of all powerlooms in the textile town of Sircilla.
The government has already completed geo-tagging of handlooms in the State and found that there are 17,000 handlooms in the state. Now, the government is taking up geo-tagging of the powerlooms and started it from Sircilla, which houses more than 30,000 powerlooms, the most in the State.
The geo-tagging work has been entrusted to a private agency, whose representatives are visiting each and every weaver owning powerlooms and collecting details like number of looms, power connection facilities, Aadhaar card details, ration card and fabric produced on the loom, among others, and sticking the geo-tagging number on the powerlooom.
Talking to The Hindu on Thursday, Assistant Director (Handlooms and Textiles) Ashok Rao said geo-tagging is aimed at identifying genuine beneficiaries and help them secure government assistance and upgrade their looms and produce value added fabric. The process of geo-tagging would be completed soon, he added.
Further, the government had decided to upgrade the outdated powerlooms in the textile town and help the weavers produce value-added fabric and increase the productivity with Central assistance.
Under the Powertex India scheme, the Central government would be extending 50 % assistance for upgrading the loom under the “in situ upgradation of plain powerlooms”.
The balance 50 % is expected to be paid by the beneficiary. But, the State government had decided to bear the beneficiary contribution and upgrade the powerlooms without any financial burden on the weaver. As part of the upgradation simple attachments costing ₹40,000 per loom would be provided to the weavers.
The Handlooms and Textiles Department had decided to conduct a mega mela with the entrepreneurs of various powerloom manufacturers from Erode, Coimbatore, Bhiwandi and Surat, among others on November 24 and 25 in Sircilla, where the weavers would be exposed to modern attachments that could be added to the existing powerlooms to produce quality fabric and also improve production.