Industries, Handloom and Textiles Minister KT Rama Rao, on the occasion of National Handloom Day celebrated on August 7 gave a call to elected representatives as well as officials to promote handloom among the public. The officials were also asked to organize ‘Handloom Run/Rally’ in all the district headquarters and mandal headquarters in the State.

To highlight the contribution of handloom industry and weavers to the national economy and culture, the Centre had in 2015 declared August 7 as the National Handloom Day. As part of the celebrations, the State government has been organizing rallies, seminars and awareness programmes on handlooms.

The Minister said that the State government had identified 17,000 handlooms in Telangana and geo-tagged them as part of a State-wide survey. The survey helped them identify problems being faced by weavers and handloom industries, encouraging them to initiate various welfare programmes, including subsidy on yarn, Pavala Vaddi scheme, block level clusters and handloom savings schemes among others.

He also asked the officials to organize an exhibition of handloom products where a live demonstration of handloom works will be arranged including cloth weaving and dying. To teach the children about the prominence of these textiles, quiz, elocution, essay writing and other competitions will be organized.

Rama Rao wanted the district administrations to invite handloom societies and committees to participate in the National Handloom Day celebrations. The government will felicitate national award winners, popular handloom weavers and designers for promoting handlooms.