Centre committed towards empowering MSMEs — DoNER minister

Our Reporter
Dimapur, Feb. 23 (EMN): Union Minister for Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), Tourism and Culture G Kishan Reddy on Wednesday stated that the Central government has remained committed towards empowering the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) and the recent Budget has given a further push to make them more competitive.

He added that MSMEs will play a critical role for the nation’s economic growth over the next 25 years of ‘Amrit Kaal’.

Addressing the ‘North East MSME Conclave: Building Competitiveness for Leveraging Opportunities’, organised by the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), Reddy highlighted that the North East region has huge untapped potential when it comes to the MSME sector and opportunities in agriculture, food processing, tourism, mineral based industries, IT, infrastructure, to name a few, need to be explored.

He also called upon all stakeholders to work together in coordination to make the most of the changing paradigm of development in the North East and promote the MSME sector.

Emphasising that the Central government has remained committed towards development of the North East region, he added that the recently announced INR 1,500 crore Prime Minister Development Initiative for the North East (PM-DevINE) scheme will prove to be a bonus for the sector.

INR 68.08 crore sanctioned for Nagaland

According to the Finance Minister’s INR 586.20 crore package sanctioned for the North Eastern region for Social and Infrastructure Development Fund (SIDF) projects, the sanctioned amount for Nagaland was INR 68.08 crore while the amount released was INR 66.97 crore as per the latest update on Jan. 31 2022.

The Ministry of DoNER updated that the sanctioned and released amount for “construction of link road from Wokha -Bokajan road to Ralan Old and New, Changalashung Old and New covering rubber plantation area in western Nagaland (length 11.00 Km)” was INR 3.21 crore; the “capital works of development in eastern part of Nagaland” sanctioned amount was INR 31.95 crore and released amount was INR 31.47 crore; the sanctioned amount for “construction of suspension bridges (28)” was INR 4.97 crore while the amount released was INR 4.88 crore and the sanctioned amount for “construction of roads and bridges (four)” was INR 27.96 crore and the amount released was INR 27.40 crore.

The total sanctioned amount for Arunachal Pradesh was INR 187.54 crore out of which an amount of INR 170.00 crore was released; the sanctioned amount for Assam was INR 103.51 crore while an amount of INR 96.67 crore was released; for Manipur the sanctioned amount was INR 124.92 crore and the amount released was INR 123.88 crore.

The sanctioned amount for Meghalaya was INR 18.84 crore out of which INR 18.19 crore has been released. For Mizoram, the sanctioned and released amount was INR 01.99 crore and for Sikkim the sanctioned amount was INR 44.20 crore out of which INR 43.58 crore has been released.