The Southern India Mills' Association (SIMA) on Sunday thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Union Textile Minister Piyush Goyal for removing the anti-dumping duty on elastomeric filament yarn.

The Southern India Mills' Association (SIMA) on Sunday thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Union Textile Minister Piyush Goyal for removing the anti-dumping duty on elastomeric filament yarn. The usage of elastomeric filament yarn in dress materials, including denim, enhances the value addition considerably and opens up opportunities to increase exports, SIMA Chairman Ravi Sam said in a statement here.

The removal of duties would create a level-playing field for the Indian textile industry in the international market and also enable it to import high quality elastomeric filament yarns that are not manufactured in India at a competitive rate, Ravi Sam added. The central government led by PM Modi has brought in several historic reforms apart from taking various bold and pro-active policy initiatives to make 'Atmanirbhar Bharat' a reality and turn India into a highly competitive manufacturer on a global scale, he further said.

The government had already removed the anti-dumping duty on most man-made fibres and their raw materials, including acrylic fibres, and now the elastomeric filament yarn is also exempt, the SIMA chairman pointed out. Ravi Sam also welcomed the timely decision of reducing excise duty on petrol by Rs 8 per litre and on diesel by Rs 6 per litre that would greatly help the textiles and clothing industry to reduce the transport cost as different manufacturing segments in the value chain are scattered across the nation.

Stating that the textile industry has already been facing a crisis owing to the skyrocketing cotton prices, the SIMA chairman thanked the government for removing the 11 per cent import duty on cotton. He added that the central excise reduction of fuel would now reduce the transportation cost of cotton to a certain extent as states like Tamil Nadu source more than 95 per cent of raw material from up-country.

Source: Moneycontrol