Our Bureau

Hyderabad, Nov. 16 The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, Dr. Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, today announced a move to waive loans worth Rs 330 crore to weavers’ cooperative societies.

After inaugurating the Pochampally Handloom Park at Kanumukkala village in Nalgonda district on Sunday, Dr Reddy said the order of waiver of loans to weaver’s cooperative societies will be issued within a week.

The Government is also trying to extend similar relief to weavers.

The State is in the process of persuading the Centre to consider waiver of loans to distressed weavers.

The Integrated Textile Park developed with an outlay of Rs 47 crore on a 24-acre site is expected to provide direct employment to over 10,000 weavers when fully completed. The park will provide a monthly income of Rs 4,000 to each weaver.

Developed with Central Government support, the park provides facilities for training, weaving and processing blocks. Apart from hosting computer added design centre, the park has an effluent treatment plant.

The park has 2,000 improvised handlooms with a capacity to weave 40 lakh metres of cloth a year. The State Government will provide marketing support.

The Union Minister for Textiles, Mr Shankersinh Vaghela, hoped that the park, established to global standards, would enable production of high quality products.

The weavers in the Pochampally cluster are engulfed with problems and hurdles in the production process like erratic supply and availability of raw material and lack of adequate skills. In addition, they work with obsolete technologies making new designs and innovations a challenging task.

Pochampally is a natural handloom weaving cluster and one of the popular silk weaving centres. This town is also famous for the Bhoodan Movement launched by Acharya Vinobha Bhave in 1951.

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