Post News Network
Bhubaneswar, August 13: To encourage budding entrepreneurs in the state, the government will soon restructure DICs (District Industry Centers) as information and facilitation centers, State MSME secretary, Panchanan Dash said in a conference here, Thursday.
“Restructuring DICs as information and facilitation centres will help budding entrepreneurs to start small scale units,” Dash said during an event on empowering SMEs through addressing their financing needs hosted by CII, Orissa chapter. He also said the revival of sick MSME units in the state will help boosting the revenue. Also, the revived units will be able to repay their dues to banks, which will help in reducing NPAs of banking sector.
On CII’s ‘Finance Facilitation Centre’, Dash said, “It is a good initiative which will strengthen the entrepreneurs through meeting their financial needs. It will also serve as a link between banks and entrepreneurs.” On rate of interest imposed by banks on MSME units, S K Behera, CII Eastern Region, MSME Chairman said, banks as well as Reserve Bank of India (RBI) must relook into the rate of interest charged by the banks in the state. “I request banks and RBI to relook into the rate of lending offered to MSMEs. It will be a great relief to this sector if RBI reduces the rate by 2-3 per cent.”
On ‘Finance Facilitation Centre’, Behera said, “It will operate as one-stop-shop, which aggregates various financing options from multiple large financial institutions for entrepreneurs. It has received sound response in other states.” As per the industry body, business proposals worth more than Rs 150 crore have been processed through these centres across the country in recent months in sectors such as manufacturing, ICT, food processing, textile, engineering, IT enabled services and e-commerce, FMCG among others.
Meanwhile, MSME director in charge MSME Development Institute, PK Gupta said, “The facilitation centre must include various MSME service providers apart from manufacturing units.”
