The Union Textiles Minister Smt. Smriti Zubin Irani, on the eve of third National Handloom Day, inaugurated a camp for weavers MUDRA and Hathkargha Samvardhan Sahayata Schemes at Bijoynagar in Assam. She also announced that weavers will henceforth be able to avail a wide array of Government services from Weavers’ Service Centres (WSCs).

The Minister said that besides providing technical assistance, the WSCs will serve as a one-stop centre for weavers, providing various services, including banking, passport, insurance, PAN card, voter ID and AADHAAR.

The Minister added that weavers will also be able to pay their electricity bills and undertake online courses at WSCs. There are 28 WSCs under the Office of Development Commissioner (Handlooms), Ministry of Textiles, functioning in various parts of the country. Weavers visit these WSCs frequently, in order to avail technical assistance in relation to their profession.

The Minister informed that the Ministry of Textiles will enter into an MoU tomorrow with Common Service Centres, which will enable WSCs to provide the aforementioned services, beginning from this year itself.

The PM Jan Dhan Yojana has eliminated middlemen and enabled transfer of public money directly to the bank account of deserving citizens. The Minister expressed her satisfaction that more than 250 women applied for MUDRA loans in just an hour after the camp started functioning. She informed the 600-odd woman weavers present, that loans ranging from Rs. 50,000/- to Rs. 10 lakh can be availed under MUDRA Yojana with no requirement for any security whatsoever.

Smt. Irani distributed MUDRA loan sanction letters to 50 weavers on the occasion, and appealed to all weavers to apply for the loan and improve their incomes.

The Minister highlighted that handloom weavers in Sambalpur, Odisha, were able to improve their earnings by more than 60% within three months of availing MUDRA loan.