Business

Piyush Goyal Wants To Create 100 Indian TEI Champions

100 textile machinery champions will put Indian TEI on the global map.
Goyal urged the TEI to focus on speed, skill and scale and innovative partnerships.
Need for synergy between Indian TEI, textiles ministry, Ministry of Heavy Industries

Union Minister Piyush Goyal has called for developing 100 Indian textile machinery champions who will be recognised across the world. Goyal also wants to reduce import dependence of the sector through concerted efforts between the textile engineering industry and the government. Goyal has asked textile machinery manufacturers to get out of command-and-control mindset and work through plug-and-play to make the textile sector vibrant in name and spirit, the textile ministry said. The Minister of Commerce and Industry, Textiles, Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution, made the remarks while interacting with textile machinery manufacturers, recently. A total of 15 textile machinery manufacturers of foreign regions, 20 leading indigenous textile manufacturers and seven textile machinery and associated industry associations participated and submitted their view points. The interaction was aimed at devising possible strategy to develop a facilitating ecosystem for growth of the textiles engineering industry (TEI) in India under the Make in India programme. He said that the National Capital Goods Policy is a manufacturing sector policy devised by the Government of India aimed at increasing the production of capital goods from the 2014-15 value of about US$ 31 billion to US$ 101 billion by 2025. Goyal urged the textile engineering industry to focus on speed, skill and scale and get into innovative partnerships. He called for developing 100 Indian textile machinery champions recognised across the world, the statement said. The minister said India should look to become a global player in producing textile machinery, producing at scale, producing with quality and quantity the machinery of choice that the world requires. This will set the momentum for continuous advancement and innovation resulting into ever evolving and enhancing competitive capabilities along the value chain. He said the machinery manufacturing facility will change the inertia of the status quo, augment the dynamics along the value chain, enhance domestic consumption and further boost exports of higher value goods while gradually reducing the import dependency, the statement said. "For this, it is important to synergise efforts of arms of the government between textiles, Ministry of Heavy Industries, and digital innovation / adaptation possibilities in our quest of increasing efficiencies by reducing costs across manufacturing value chain," the minister stated. He referred to Mission Chandrayan, which was a breakthrough in India's space programme and called upon textile machinery manufacturers to look at a similar breakthrough in the textiles sector. “We are on a mission of transformational change. When the PM speaks of Atmanirbhar Bharat, it means to provide India its rightful place on the global map," he said. He added that the Indian textile engineering industry is at the cornerstone of moving up the manufacturing excellence, wherein the domestic research and development (R&D), entrepreneurial spirit and exploration of joint ventures have ushered in new opportunities. Talking about the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme, which talks of global champions and PM-MITRA scheme, Goyal said seven locations will be identified soon to encourage the industry and prepare a common infrastructure for plug-and-play. The minister said there are still some challenges like liquidity and rising costs of raw materials and freight movement for which the government is actively taking many steps, so that the textile engineering industry can overcome from such issues confidently. He also suggested that there is no harm in getting international capital which will help in creation of jobs in India and add value and expand the entire textiles ecosystem.