National Scheduled Castes Finance and Development Corporation

• National Scheduled Castes Finance and Development Corporation (NSFDC) under Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment and Development Commissioner (Handlooms) under Ministry of Textiles have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
• The objective of signing this MoU is to help Scheduled Caste weavers and their families by promoting production and marketing of high value quality Handlooms products at Block level Cluster in various States like Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Odisha etc.
• Asper the MoU, signing parties shall popularize the schemes of Handlooms amongst the SC weavers through Awareness Programmes and advertisements in electronic/print media in SC weavers concentrated areas.
• They shall collaborate for capacity building including skill upgradation and economic development of SC weavers and their families for achieving the desired outcome.
• Exhibitions/Fairs shall be organized by both the parties for providing marketing assistance to SC weavers for enhancing their earnings.

About NSFDC:

• NSFDC was setup by the Govt. of India on february 08,1989 with the name National Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Finance and Development Corporation (NSFDC) .
• It was incorporated as a fully owned Government of India Company under Section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013 .
• It has been assigned the task for financing, facilitating and mobilizing funds for the economic empowerment of persons living below Double of the Poverty Line (DPL).
• It provides financial assistance for income generating schemes for the target group through state Channelizing Agencies (SCAs) which are nominated by respective State/UT Government.
• This is managed by a Board of Directors with representation from Central Government, State Scheduled Castes Development Corporations, Financial Institutions and non-official members representing Scheduled Castes.

Analysis:

• India has the world’s largest number of handloom weavers and an extremely rich heritage of handloom products. Until only a few decades ago, India had the most diverse cotton varieties, providing the most suitable raw material for handloom weaving.
• But,  India has not been able to ensure sustainable and satisfactory livelihoods for handloom weavers. The grim reality today is that an overwhelming majority of handloom weavers are living in poverty, while many others have left the occupation based on intricate skills to toil as construction workers and rickshaw pullers. Several have also migrated out of areas earlier known as famous handloom centres.
• Raw material base of the handloom industry – several region-specific cotton varieties suitable for handloom weaving – has been destroyed. Cotton cultivation is now dominated by American cotton varieties not suitable for handlooms and, more recently, by the problematic genetically modified BT cotton. As many natural forests have been destroyed and/or replaced by monoculture plantations, the potential of sericulture to support silk handlooms has also reduced.
• In the WTO trade regime of very low tariffs, indiscriminate imports of mechanised imitations of handloom products have increased rapidly, taking away the market for original handloom weavers.
• Thus the crucial areas of raw material supply and marketing are increasingly threatened. The internal structure of the industry has also seen changes which have increased the problems of small-scale, independent weavers who complain that the benefits of government schemes do not reach them at all.
• Also, the gross inadequacy of government efforts to help handloom weavers is increasingly visible. The large-scale violation of its own laws to protect handlooms has been ignored by governments obsessed only by production targets and caring little for the protection of livelihoods. The framework of government policies is also very limited. It doesn’t care at all for the loss of precious indigenous varieties of cotton crop.
• To ensure the sustainable progress of handlooms, several stages of the work, intricately related to each other, need to be protected. There is the need to grow cotton varieties suitable for handloom weaving in different areas, to ensure decentralised spinning of this cotton and for tying up various other ancillary works.
• Similarly in the case of silk handlooms, there is need to link up sericulture, ancillary works and handloom weaving.
• Due to the widely perceived need to check greenhouse gas emissions, the case for handloom cloth is becoming stronger by the day. If handloom cloth can be linked closely to organic cultivation of non-GM cotton, its strength as eco-friendly cloth can become much stronger. This is going to be a big asset in the days to come.

By: Vishal