Agartala, January 09, 2023: Union Minister for Micro, Small and Medium Industries, Narayan Rane on Monday said that the states like Assam and Sikkim have performed very well in the MSME sector in last couple of years and Tripura will also do well in the days to come.
After attending the regional conference on sustainable development goals for MSMEs in North East, union minister N Rane in a press conference said that the budgetary allocations for the North Eastern states of India have been increased by Rs 8,000 crore in the current financial year under the Ministry of MSME.
“The budgetary allocation for the North East was Rs 68,000 crore in the financial year of 2021-22 and in the current fiscal year, the budget has been escalated to Rs 76,000 crore”, he added.
He said, “To take stock of the developmental works from ground zero, I have come here. According to my observation, the North East region in recent times has performed very well. The allocated fund of Rs 68,000 crore in last fiscal year was utilized completely.”
Citing achievements of states in this region, union MSME minister said “Sikkim has come up as one of the successful states with per capita income of Rs 4 lakh followed by Assam, as work is going on in an expeditious manner. In the case of Tripura, we had talks regarding some plans with the Chief Minister Prof Dr Manik Saha.”
Replying to a query regarding the key sectors where MSME can flourish, Rane said “There is huge potential in the Tourism sector and the Goa government is earning 95 percent of the total revenue from this sector. In Tamil Nadu, Balaji temple records a large number of footfalls throughout the year. We are entirely sanguine about the Tourism sector.”
“We have consulted with the Chief Minister of Tripura to come up with an innovative plan centering the Mata Tripureshwari Temple in Udaipur under Gomati district. In next three years, a target has been set to project a per capita income of over Rs 2 lakh”, he added.
It is worthy to mention here that Tripura’s per capita income stands at Rs 1.3 lakh presently while the national average is Rs 1.8 lakh.
Meanwhile, Tripura CM Dr Saha inaugurating the two-day long regional conference on Monday morning said that the state is blessed with abundance of natural resources including bamboo, rubber and natural gas, and based on them, the state government is sincerely working to set up big and small industries based on all these natural resources of the state as state’s GDP growth through setting up industries is the ultimate goal of the government.
Apart from this, the Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Mercy Epao in a press conference on Sunday last said that under the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Program (PMEGP) scheme, 140 crore rupees have been given to the North Eastern states so far. As a result, 1 lakh 14 thousand micro enterprises have been formed in the North Eastern states. In total, 7 lakh 60 thousand jobs have been created in these companies. Rs 135 crore 45 lakh has been disbursed till now by the Ministry for 29 projects under the Cluster Development Programme. Initiatives are being taken from this ministry for overall development of SC, STs.
