Textile Machinery Manufacturers’ hosts AGM and Export and R&D Awards

Roop Rashi, Textile Commissioner-Mumbai, Ministry of Textiles, T Rajkumar, Chairman, Confederation of Indian Textile Industry and various other stalwarts from the textile engineering industry (TEI) were present during the event.

The Textile Machinery Manufacturers Association organised its 62ndAnnual General Meeting and Export and R&D Awards. Roop Rashi, Textile Commissioner-Mumbai, Ministry of Textiles, T Rajkumar, Chairman, Confederation of Indian Textile Industry and various other stalwarts from the textile engineering industry (TEI) were present during the event. Pratik Bachkaniwala, Chairman, TMMA, welcomed the guest and briefed about the Indian TEI in general and enumerated the role of the association in the year gone by. He presented the AGM report to the audience and stated, “It has been an absolutely prosperous year, especially after the bumpy ride of the previous year. The fiscal year 2021-22 has shown one of the best growths of the entire textile and the textile machinery industry in the last few decades. A 130% production, 94% capacity utilization, 58% jump in exports and a 14% rise in the installed capacity that was stagnant for almost a decade; substantiates it all. The year started on a gloomy note with the pandemic hovering our neighbourhoods and compelling us to be grounded now and then.” The TEI scaled up its estimated annual installed capacity of Rs 12,500 crore per annum. The total provisional production of textile machinery, parts & accessories during 2021-22 recorded a substantial increase of 130% viz Rs 11,700 crore in 2021-22 as against Rs 5,095 crore achieved during 2020-21. Except the complete lockdown during Q1 of 2021-22 due to the disastrous second wave of Covid Pandemic, the majority of the industry segments continued on the momentum of the market gains picked up during 2nd, 3rd and 4th quarters of 2020-21quite well. Both greenfield and brown field projects were explored with clients during the Q2, Q3 & Q4 of the fiscal. Throughout the year, the capacity utilisation was close to 100% and the industry was able to achieve up to 130% of their annual turnover as compared to 2020-21.

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”
After a decade of persistent efforts, for the first time the Ministry of Textiles have recognised us as their integral part and hence we are now being considered to be a part of their new scheme.

The association is closely working in this regard with the MoT to prepare a draft for ‘Textile Technology Development Scheme (TTDS)’ that would benefit both the textile and the textile machinery industry. With a proposed budget outlay of approximately Rs 16,500 crore for 5 years the draft scheme is still under deliberation. There may be lot of iterations and additions before it could be announced after cabinet’s approval during 2022-23.

Roop Rashi whole heartedly congratulated TEI on making strong foundation of entire value chain in textile industry. She also reiterated that industry is doing good shape even though we are facing various challenges and concerns under TUF schemes. She also suggested to push more focus on asset definitions which eventually simplify the process of implementation in TUF scheme and also this would help in resolve the past pending issues/cases.

T Rajkumar said, “We have a strong Government at the Centre and under the dynamic leadership of Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, the Indian T&A industry is extremely hopeful of touching the mark of US$ 350 bn T&A market including $ 100 bn exports in years to come.”

Export and R&D Awards
In this Session, TMMA gave awards for Export Excellence, segment wise export performance awards and Awards for R&D for the year 2021-22.
The Association’s Export Awards Scheme covered the following categories of awards: –
1. Apex Export Award
2. Segment Export Awards for each of the major sectors of the Textile Machinery Industry i.e.
a. Textile Machinery Sector
b. Parts and Accessories Sector
c. Textile Testing, Monitoring & Controlling Instruments Sector
3. Special Export Awards: Category-wise
The Association also presents Research and Development Awards for indigenous development of new technology/processes under different categories in the field of Textile Machinery Industry.

The Indian Card Clothing (ICC) created a lasting impression on the event by winning prizes in the categories of New Design Tops for High Production Cards and Parts and Accessories Sector. Alok Misra, CEO, ICC, said, “This award has a great reputation, thus we are honoured to receive it. We have worked very hard on this R&D project because the product is patented. We have conducted extensive field tests. And a trustworthy institution like NITRA carried out the research for this product validation.”

Ashok Kumar Pal, Vice President, ICC, added to this accomplishment by saying, “Our journey began about three to four years ago, and we weren’t doing well in the export market. However, last year, we entered a lot of markets, including those in South-East Asia, Europe, and the Middle East, and after joining these markets, we were successful. It’s a really humble moment for ICC, and moving forward, we’ll work to improve our performance. Regarding innovation, we have created high-speed carding technologies that will be a game-changer in the market for ICC! “

Lakshmi Card Clothing gained another achievement when it was recognised in the Parts & Accessories Sector and Centura cylinder wire clothing for carding machines category. N Jagadeesan, Deputy General Manager, Exports of the Company, LCC, stated, “We feel incredibly honoured to have received these awards. LCC has received awards for both export and R&D. We received this award the previous year as well, and this year we have repeated it, so we are constantly striving to improve.”