In the last five years, 86,000 MSMEs set up shop and Rs 92,000 crore of credit was disbursed to the MSME sector in West Bengal, according to Rajiva Sinha, secretary, department of micro and small scale enterprises and textiles, government of West Bengal. He was speaking at the Business Standard Smart Business panel discussion on ‘MSMEs: Challenges & Opportunities’, organised in association with the Calcutta Chamber of Commerce.
Sinha listed out the initiatives taken by the state government to facilitate the growth of the sector. Bengal happened to be the only state in the country where single window service was available from the MSME facilitation centre in every district, he said.
Pawan Kumar Agrawal, president of the chamber, pointed out that technological obsolescence and financial constraints had been associated with the sector for long.
Pradip Kumar Saha, representing the credit guarantee trust for small and micro enterprises for the eastern and north eastern region, said that the offtake for the credit guarantee scheme initially had been slow, but had picked up in recent times.
On the technology front, Sinha said, the state's Technology Facilitation Centre was always available to offer any kind of help.
Another issue raised was land. Indian Plastics Federation president, Pradip Nayyar said that MSME units need to be near cities, preferably in a 20 km radius. He urged the state government to create land banks near the city.
Sinha, in turn, said that land was not an issue. "We have a scheme, approved industrial parks, where the government gives money to set up a park with power substation, two-kilometre access road,” he pointed out.
