SIDBI provides first approval of Rs.600 crores to Government of Maharashtra under SIDBI Cluster Development Fund

New Delhi, April 22, 2022: Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), the principal financial institution engaged in the promotion, financing, and development of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) has provided the first approval under SIDBI Cluster Development Fund (SCDF) to Government of Maharashtra.
 
An in-principle approval letter was been issued by SIDBI to the Government of Maharashtra for an amount of Rs.600 crores for reviving / upgrading various ITIs / Polytechnics, being run by the Directorate of Vocational Education and Training under the Department of Skills, Employment, Entrepreneurship and Innovation. These ITIs / Polytechnics complement the MSME Clusters in the state through availability of properly trained skilled manpower through hands-on skill training, which is the demand of the MSMEs. These ITIs are generally located near the Industry Clusters so that after completing their training at ITI, tradesmen can undergo apprenticeship training in different industry clusters. The demand for skilled manpower in the Maharashtra has been sharply increased due to newly launched schemes of Government namely Make in India, Digital India, Smart Cities and Clean India Mission. The ITIs are getting ready to take up the new task and would play an important role for meeting the skilled manpower demand of the MSMEs generated through these new schemes.
 
Shri Sivasubramanian Ramann, IA&AS, Chairman and Managing Director of SIDBI said, “The active participation of State Government run institutions through their upgradation and revival, in the journey of MSME development, shall provide necessary impetus to fulfilling the much desired need of availability skilled manpower of the MSME ecosystem and shall facilitate achieving a higher efficiency by the system.”  
The Expert Committee on MSMEs headed by Shri U.K. Sinha has recommended a more focused engagement of SIDBI with State Governments for MSME development and promotion including use of Priority Sector Shortfall (PSS) funds to create a low-cost lending window for State Governments for infrastructure projects in clusters.  Accordingly, SIDBI has set up Project Management Units (PMUs) in 11 states namely, Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujrat, Haryana, Maharashtra, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Tamil Nadu., The PMUs in co-ordination with SIDBI and State Governments have given policy/scheme inputs on Innovation Voucher Programme scheme, New Entrepreneur cum Enterprise Development Scheme, undertaken rapid profiling of migrant labors options for entrepreneurship in PMU States etc.
 
SCDF has been setup with support of RBI to support the hard infrastructure facilities in clusters., pan India. The fund is envisaged to support setting up, upgrading and renovation of MSME infrastructure in areas other than agriculture.  The major sectors include industrial and agri-allied sectors in the MSME eco-space, social sector projects in and around MSME clusters and connectivity to MSME Clusters. SIDBI has already accorded an in-principal sanction of more than Rs.5968 crores for the development / upgradation of various Industry Cluster Projects to various State Governments / Union Territories across the country.