New Delhi, April 15 -- The Ministry of Small and Medium Enterprises is in touch with the Department of Financial Services to explore an ECLGS-like credit guarantee scheme to support MSMEs amid the West Asia crisis, a senior official stated on Wednesday.
Responding to a media query on whether a credit guarantee scheme was in the works for MSMEs, Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) Rajneesh said, "We are in constant touch with the Department of Financial Services regarding ECLGS kind of a mechanism. So, at an appropriate stage I will be in a position to share further details on this".
The Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS) was launched in May 2020 as part of Aatmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan to support eligible MSMEs and enterprises in meeting their operational liabilities and restarting their businesses in the context of the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The scheme covers all the sectors.
Field officers of the MSME Ministry are in constant touch with MSME associations and the National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC) to provide domestic bulk raw materials to MSMEs, Rajneesh said.
"So, in the last three months, more than one lakh metric tonne of raw material has been provided. If we look at the figures of March on a year-to-year basis, a 12.5 per cent increase has happened," he added.
Addressing an inter-ministerial briefing here on the developments in West Asia, Rajneesh said the MSME Ministry continues to engage with all stakeholders and believes in a holistic government approach, with the situation being closely monitored by the ministry as it is committed to supporting MSMEs.
He observed that the ministry is conducting stakeholder consultations regularly with all MSME associations at the central, state and sub-state levels, and all field offices of the ministry are constantly in touch with them.
"I would like to share that despite the global headwinds, more than 20 lakh micro, small and medium enterprises have registered on the Udyam portal of the ministry in February and March.
"So, this is a sign of resilience of the MSMEs of India, and presently, the total number of MSMEs registered with us has crossed more than eight crore," the additional
secretary said.
"The credit flow in the micro, small and medium enterprises is one of the core areas on which we work, and I am happy to share that the credit outstanding with the micro, small and medium enterprises stands at over Rs 36.7 lakh crore. In the last quarter, January, February and March, the growth in credit flow to the MSMEs has been 23.5 per cent," he added.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.