New Delhi, Jan 31,2015: Shri Kalraj Mishra, Union Minister for Micro Small and Medium Enterprises made two days visit (29-30-Jan) to the North-Eastern States today. The Minister had chaired the review meeting at Guwahati with all the stakeholders of the Prime Minister Employment Generation Programme (PMEGP) in respect of North-Eastern States.
PMEGP is the flagship scheme of Ministry of MSME and is an effective instrument for generating employment opportunities in urban and rural India through setting up of micro enterprises.
The unemployment rate in India is estimated to be around 8.8% as compared to 6.1% in USA, 3.9% in Japan. The solution for this malady is urban and rural industrialization which can generate employment opportunities. PMEGP scheme is successful in addressing this issue. Since inception of the Scheme in 2008-09, a total of 2.89 lakh units were set up in the country generating 25.41 lakh employments by disbursing Rs.5652.47 crore as margin money till 31.12.2015. In North Eastern States, since inception of Scheme a total of 48195 have been set up, involving margin money of Rs.557.90 crores and providing employment to 2.90 lakhs persons.
The performance under PMEGP at national level has improved significantly in 2014-15 due to the concentrated efforts under the 100 days action plan. Disbursement of margin money has touched to Rs.495.03 Crs with 20,351 projects and employment opportunities to 1,58,230 person as on 23rd January, 2015 in all over the country. However, in NE States against the target of Rs.175.54 Crs. achievement has touched to Rs.29.46 crs. only, this is a matter of concern. The position has been reviewed in the meeting and also the bottlenecks were examined.
The Minister had expressed that the discussions held during the review meeting with all the stakeholders, including representatives of various Banks, States officials and other beneficiaries, will be fruitful on crucial areas like collateral free loans, timely bank sanctions, release of margin money subsidy and loan installment, coverage of credit guarantee scheme, achievement of social category targets of SC, ST, minority, women etc. The meeting will encourage all the stakeholders and will leads to better implementation of PMEGP Scheme in North-Eastern States, thereby achieving the set targets in time and providing better employment opportunities to the youths in the NE States.CCI Newswire
