Credit and finance for MSMEs: Hailing the government’s Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS), launched post-Covid for ailing MSMEs, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said around 1.5 crore jobs were saved due to the credit support. “About 1.5 crore jobs which were threatened during the Corona crisis were saved after the central government provided more than Rs 3 lakh crore to MSMEs,” PM Modi said on Saturday launching the Rozgar Mela after distributing government job appointment letters to 75,000 candidates.
“Today crores of people are working in the MSMEs and small industries, in which a large number of youth have joined in recent years,” PM Modi added as he also highlighted startups’ contribution to jobs.
“Where there were a few hundred startups in the country till 2014, today this number has increased to more than 80,000. Many companies worth thousands of crores of rupees have been created during this period by our young colleagues. Today lakhs of youth are working in these thousands of startups of the country.”
In terms of entrepreneurship or self-employment, the Prime Minister highlighted the government’s Mudra scheme, which enables credit up to Rs 10 lakh for the setting up of micro enterprises, generally proprietary concerns at the bottom of the entrepreneurial pyramid.
PM Modi said Rs 20 lakh crore Mudra loans have been given so far and out of the total Mudra beneficiaries, over 7.5 crore people have started their businesses for the first time. Also, around 70 per cent of the beneficiaries are women. “Such a big program related to self-employment has never been implemented in the country before,” he added.
The Prime Minister also noted the government’s skilling initiative under Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana to boost SMEs, agriculture and private sector as they are the largest employment-generating sectors in the country. “So far more than 1.25 crore youth have been trained under the Skill India campaign. Skill development centers have been set up across the country in this regard. Hundreds of new institutions of higher education have also been established by the central government in these eight years,” he added.
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