The Hindu Business Line : House panel flays Govt on textile support schemes

New Delhi May 2 The Textile Ministry's penchant for frequent announcement of new policy packages for the textile sector has come in for criticism from the Standing Committee on Labour.

The panel has said that "instead of loading the sector with a plethora of half-baked schemes, there should be a few effective and well-planned ones," to assist the textile industry and make it globally competitive.

Analysing the Demands for Grants of the Ministry of Textiles for 2007-08, the panel, headed by Mr Suravaram Sudhakar Reddy, said that more than Rs 100 crore has remained unspent at the end of each year of the 10th Five-Year Plan (2002-07).

The annualised outlay for the Plan has been Rs 4,852.50 crore, while utilisation has been Rs 4,452.60 crore (up to March 31, 2007).

The committee said that one of the principal reasons for unspent balance has been the introduction of new schemes and modifications of existing ones.

As a result, the Ministry has been unable to forecast the exact amount of Plan expenditure.

It also said that there have been withdrawal, modifications and merger of schemes with other schemes almost in all segments of textiles, viz., handlooms, sericulture and handicrafts.

Merger of schemes

The committee has been informed that in order to give a focused thrust to the handloom sector, a dozen extant schemes would be grouped into five schemes.

During the 11th Plan, the existing 11 handicrafts schemes would be merged into seven, with accent on cluster development and welfare of artisans.

Yet, the committee is of the view that "the modifications in existing schemes/introduction of new ones which may be half-baked as well would only hamper the pace of expenditure."

This is presumably so, it said, because it entails completion of fresh procedural formalities.

Also, the process undergoes a test of acceptance by the beneficiaries through implementing agencies and the assimilation of new schemes takes time.

Developmental and welfare schemes of the textile sector should be selected carefully after a thorough study, failing which the ambitious $115-billion market size target set by the working group of textiles and jute industries for the 11th Plan would remain a distant dream, it said.

The committee also said that due to involvement of various Government agencies, project clearance takes lot of time.

Hence, it called for close liaison and co-ordination among various Government agencies for expeditious clearance of the projects so as to avoid time and cost overruns.

It has also suggested further simplification of procedural formalities.

On the proliferation of textile parks - as many as 30 such parks have been sanctioned in various States - the committee said the establishment of these parks should be resolved in such a way that a balance is maintained among various regions/States so that the benefits are equally divided.

On the Technology Mission on Cotton, launched in 2002, it said that no evaluation study has been done on the performance of the first two mini-missions set up under the mission.

The mini-missions were meant for R&D in cotton sector and dissemination of technology to farmers.

These activities are of crucial significance and have direct bearing on the functioning of the next two mini-missions, which are aimed at improving marketing infrastructure and modernisation of ginning and pressing factories respectively.