Parliamentary panel extends assurance to TN textile industry

Coimbatore, Jan 19 (PTI): The Parliamentary StandingCommittee on Labour on Tuesday assured the textile industryof considering its appeals and making suitablerecommendations so that Tamil Nadu, especially Tirupur andCoimbatore, prospers in man-made fibre (MMF) textile-manufacturing.

The panel interacted with the National Committee onTextiles & Clothing (NCTC).

The NCTC comprises Confederation of Indian TextileIndustry (CITI), Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC),Cotton Textiles Export Promotion Council, Synthetic & RayonTextiles Export Promotion Council, Powerloom DevelopmentExport Promotion Council, Indian Technical TextileAssociation and Tirupur Exporters Association (TEA).

NCTC coordinator T Rajkumar and AEPC chairman Dr ASakthivel told the committee that Tamil Nadu, being thelargest textile manufacturing state accounting for one-thirdsof the textile business of the nation, has the potential toattract new investments.

Since the country, particularly Tamil Nadu, has reachedsaturation point in the manufacture of cotton textiles andclothing products, there is a scope to grab opportunitiesthrown by China, especially in the post-COVID-19 scenario, ifa conducive policy is announced for MMF textiles and clothingproducts, a NCTC press release said.

The anti-dumping duty and customs duty protection givenfor the domestic manufacturers and 18 per cent GST on MMF and12 per cent GST on MMF yarn have been curtailing the growthof the MMF sector.

The country could not import even speciality fibres thatare not manufactured by it under nil duty.

The MMF raw materials are produced by only a fewmanufacturers.

Cotton produced by over six million farmers does notattract any duty and made available cheaper than theinternational price.

MMF being expensive upto 23 per cent, there was the needto recommend removal of anti-dumping duty and also slottingthe entire MMF value chain under 5 per cent GST rate on parwith cotton value chain apart from addressing inverted dutystructure issues at processing and capital goods.

Since the new labour codes would be implemented shortly,NCTC has sought certain amendments in the new codes to ensureease of doing business.

Fixing uniform minimum wages across the country for alltrades/job roles is essential to create a level-playingfield.

NCTC also appealed to the parliamentary committee to advisestate governments to avoid applying Juvenile Justice Act thatdefines the child labour as below 18 years below whileFactories Act permits employment of adolescent workers agedbetween 16 and 18 subject to certain conditions.

Tamil Nadu textiles and clothing industry pays highestwages rates and better welfare faclities to the workers,which was evident from millions of migrant workers coming tothe state from different parts of the country and employed inthe state.

The officials from the Ministry of Textiles briefed aboutthe various schemes and recommendations made by the Ministryto facilitate global competitiveness and enhance MMFproduction in the country.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee is chaired byBhartruhari Mahtab and MPs K Subbarayan (Tirupur) andShanmugam (Rajya Sabha).

They visited Tirupur and Coimbatore to study the potentialfor the growth of MMF textile industry.

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