Prime Minister Narendra Modi On Thursday assured the MSME sector that the Center is ready to make necessary policy changes to encourage small entrepreneurs as they play a vital role in the government’s ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ (self-reliant) initiative.
Addressing the ‘Entrepreneur India’ programme, the Prime Minister encouraged small entrepreneurs to register themselves on the GeM portal for supplying goods to the government.
“MSMEs are essential for a self-reliant India… MSME sector has played a vital role in shaping self-reliant India in the last 8 years,” Modi said, adding that he would like to see one crore new registrations on the GeM portal next week. Huh.
Modi said the government has increased the budget by over 650 per cent in the last eight years to strengthen the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) sector.
Modi said: “If an industry wants to grow, expand, the government is not only supporting it, but is also making necessary changes in policies.” He also informed that the turnover of Khadi and Village Industries has crossed one lakh crore rupees for the first time and the sale of Khadi has increased four times in the last eight years.
Earlier, Modi launched Rs 6,000 crore ‘Rising and Accelerating MSME Performance’ (RAMP) scheme and also launched the first ever Capacity Building of MSME Exporters (CBFTE) scheme to encourage exports of products and services.
The Prime Minister also launched new features of the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Program (PMEGP). These include raising the maximum project cost to Rs 50 lakh (from Rs 25 lakh) for the manufacturing sector and Rs 20 lakh (from Rs 10 lakh) in the services sector.