The handicrafts sector is one of the largest employment generators and accounts for a significant share in the country’s exports. The Indian handicrafts industry is fragmented, with more than 7 million regional artisans and more than 67,000 exporters/export houses promoting regional art and craftsmanship in the domestic and global markets. Over the last few months, the government has put specific stress on ‘Skill, Scale, Speed’ in the textile industry for scaling up employment, production and export.

The Ministry of Textiles, under the leadership of Hon’ble Minister of State for Textiles (I/C), Santosh Kumar Gangwar, has initiated several measures for promotion of the textiles industry in general and the handicrafts industry in particular.

Under the programme namely “Linking Textiles with Tourism” major tourist places are being linked with Handicrafts Clusters and Infrastructure Support combined with Soft interventions are being proposed in such clusters to create awareness, and value-proposition for handicraft items, and also create demand in domestic market, publicity campaign has been initiated. Under this programme Raghurajpur in Odisha has been taken up for over-all development with an sanctioned amount of Rs. 10.00 Crores with release of 3.00 cores under this programme during 2014-15.

In terms of the recommendations of Working Group on 12th Five Year Plan for handicrafts sector, a Hastkala Academy is proposed to be set up with the objective to support, preservation, revival, and documenting of the handicraft/handloom under Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode with the following aims and objectives :

To encourage and promote study, research and awareness of the cultural traditions, histories and practices in the fields of traditional arts, handicrafts & handloom sector.
To support preservation, revival, archiving and documentation of heritage handloom and handicrafts and traditional arts, which may be under threat of extinction.
To encourage the establishment of small art and craft museums presenting artistic and cultural knowledge along-with artifacts in different regions of the country.
To promote cooperation and collaboration among artists, crafts persons and their associations and assist the development of such associations.

Under Infrastructure and Technology Development Scheme an Urban Haat at Mammallapuram (Chennai) has been sanctioned at a project cost of Rs. 3.00 crores with release of Rs. 83.80 lakhs during 2015-16 in favour of Tamil Nadu Handicrafts Development Corporation Ltd., Chennai (TN).

Under Infrastructure and Technology Development Scheme an Urban Haat at Eluru (Andhra Pradesh) has been sanctioned at a project cost of Rs. 3.00 crores with release of Rs. 78.60 lakhs during 2015-16 in favour of Shilparamam Arts, Crafts & Cultural Society, Madhapur, Hyderabad.

A Special Project for Integrated Development and Promotion of Handicrafts is sanctioned for 19000 artisans at a project cost of Rs. 20.38 crores with release of Rs. 10.19 crores during 2015-16 in favour of Tamilnadu Handicrafts Development Corporation Ltd., Chennai (T.N).

A Special Project for Integrated Development and Promotion of Handicrafts is sanctioned for 22600 artisans at a project cost of Rs. 30.00 crores with release of Rs. 15.00 crores during 2015-16 in favour of Jharcraft, Jharkhand State.

A Special Project for Integrated Development and Promotion of Handicrafts is sanctioned for 18,300 artisans at a project cost of Rs. 25.15crores with release of Rs. 9.09crores during 2015-16 in favour of Handicrafts Development Corporation of Kerala, Thirvanthupuram, Kerala.

A Special Project for Integrated Development and Promotion of Handicrafts is sanctioned for 23,580 artisans at a project cost of Rs. 23.12 crores with release of Rs. 5.73crores during 2015-16 in favour of Sant Ravidas Madhya Pradesh hasthshilp Evam Hathkargha Vikas Nigam Ltd., Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh.