MSME Ministry to ready in-depth devlopment plan in 6 months: Govt

MSME Ministry is expected to ready an in-depth plan to revitalise the country's micro, small and medium enterprises within six months time, a sector that contributes almost 38% to the country's GDP and over 42% to its overall exports.

"The Ministry is in the process of preparing a comprehensive development strategy for the sector in consultation with all stake-holders. This is expected to be ready within a period of 6 months," MSME Minister Kalraj Mishra said in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha.

The estimated contribution of manufacturing sector micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to GDP, during 2012-13, is 7.04%. However, taking into account the contribution of services sector MSME, which is estimated at 30.5% during 2012-13, the share of MSME sector in GDP of the country during 2012-13 is 37.54%.

The share of MSME in India's total exports for the year 2013-14, has been estimated at 42.38%.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley recently unveiled a slew of measures to catalyse development of the MSME sector.

Presenting the maiden budget of the Narendra Modi-led government earlier this month, Jaitley laid special thrust on promotion of start-ups and allocated Rs 10,000 crore for setting up a venture capital fund for the MSME sector.

Jaitley also proposed a technology centre network to promote innovation, entrepreneurship and agro-industry by setting up a fund with a corpus of Rs 200 crore.

To further promote SMEs, Jaitley said an entrepreneur friendly 'legal bankruptcy framework' will be developed for SMEs to enable easy exit. Moreover, he said, a nationwide 'District level Incubation and Accelerator Programme' would be taken up for incubation of new ideas and providing necessary support for accelerating entrepreneurship.