New Delhi, Expressing serious concern over the suicide by 23 hand loom and power loom weavers in Sircilla in Andhra Pradesh, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Labour and Textile has asked the government to waive the existing loan of heavily indebted weavers who are unable to repay. The loan amounts to Rs 350 crore.

"Some mechanism should be devised to waive the existing loan of weavers who are heavily indebted and are not in a position to repay the loan to the local money lenders. This will not only go a long way in bringing out the poor weavers from the clutches of finance units and private money lenders ending their exploitation, but will also pave the way for the healthy growth of textile sector as well as of the weavers in the country," chairman of the committee S Sudhakar Reddy told a news conference here on Wednesday.

After submitting report titled general conditions of weavers in the country-A case study of Sircilla concentration zone of weavers to the Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, Reddy said the committee strongly recommended that with a view to overcome the problem, the government should consider to form a hand loom bank on the pattern of NABARD and SIDBI.

He said to start with specialized branches could be set up in the highly concentrated zone of weavers from amongst nationalized and cooperative banks. According to Reddy the incidents of suicides by weavers should be an eye opener to the government to become proactive in protecting the interests of the weavers both from hand loom and power loom sector.

"Instead of distributing ex-gratia after the suicides and salvaging actions, it will be in the fitness of things if suo-motto initiatives are taken in the right earnest to promote weavers' welfare while formulating policies and schemes for the textile sector as a whole," the chairman of the standing committee suggested.

The committee has in its report strongly recommended that with an identified objective, argent steps should be taken to conduct a survey of weavers and other workers engaged in the hand loom and power loom sector in the country to ascertain their figures and to identify the real problem plaguing the weavers' community.

Reddy said among other things the committee has also suggested the government to take measures to form cooperatives, associations and self help groups of weavers, appoint a high-level committee to evaluate the performance of the existing welfare schemes for the workers, promote local traditional and indigenous designs and technology up-gradition.

On the wage revision of the weavers the report said that minimum wages to weavers across the country be ensured and it should be revised from time to time taking into consideration the price index and other related factors.

"In order to sustain the market and to give a fillip, some buy back arrangements by the government should be made for the hand loom products. This will help reduce the monopoly of a few to manipulate and influence the hand loom market according to their whims and fancies," the report underlined.

It also demanded the government to issue identity cards to all eligible weavers, scholarship to their children, bridge school for drop outs, anthodaya ration cards for households, health care centres in hand loom clusters, review of insurance scheme and regular mechanism to review and monitor the schemes for taking corrective measures.

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