KVIC's digitisation boosts govt's job scheme

KVIC, the nodal agency for implementing the Prime Minister's Employment Generation Programme (PMEGP) scheme, has said it has received 4,04,354 online applications since it launched online portal in July last year, compared to 59,479 applications till June.
The MSME Ministry had set a target for job creation of Rs 1,100 crore for PMEGP in 2016-17, which was achieved before the stipulated time on March 15.
"The ministry then added another Rs 100 crore in the target, which also was achieved on March 25. Again, Rs 50 crore was added in it, but our overall achievement also crossed it with the annual figure of Rs 1,281 crore in 2016- 17," KVIC Chairman V K Saxena said.

"Altogether 3,98,955 new employment was generated, with an estimated project cost of Rs 4,778 crore and that is a huge growth of approximately 24 percent with respect to financial year 2015-16," he said in a press release.
Saxena said the Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) has been increasing its organisational capacity to create more jobs for which it has digitised its online portal, bringing in transparency.
The software used for digitisation of PMEGP was developed in-house by the IT team of the KVIC, subsequently saving almost Rs 20 crore of the government money, he said.

The government had implemented PMEGP in 2008 by merging two schemes in operation -- Prime Minister's Rojgar Yojana (PMRY) and Rural Employment Generation Programme (REGP), with the KVIC as the nodal agency.

He said the KVIC has also digitised the entire payment process of the Market Promotion and Development Assistance (MPDA) scheme, for supporting implementation of Khadi programme.
Under MPDA, a financial assistance of 30 per cent of the prime cost of khadi and polyvastra has been provided to institutions - which will be distributed amongst 40 per cent each to artisans and producing institutions and 20 per cent to selling isnstitutions through online transfers, he said.