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The Khadi and Village Industries Commission has taken up an initiative to revive all the Khadi institutions that had closed for want for adequate working capital and marketing support.

As of 2011, 267 Khadi institutions had got closed. Of them, 143 have been revived over the past three years and the remaining would also be soon brought on their feet in a phased manner. Announcing this, KVIC Chairman, V.K.Saxena, said a sum of Rs. 3.09 crore was released in 2014-15, Rs. 1.06 crore in 2015-16 and Rs. Rs. 3.08 crore in 2016-17 for the revival programme. The balance institutions would be revived in a phased manner.

Meanwhile, he said, 152 new khadi institutions have also been registered during the last two years â 89 in 2015-16 and 63 in 2016-17.

In addition on October 2 last year, to mark Gandhi Jayanti, KVIC launched  Ã¢ÂÂKhadi Institutions Registration and Certification Sewaâ (KIRCS), an online portal for Registration of new institutions and bringing more and more people to join the Khadi movement in rural areas. The portal has drastically reduced the time taken for registration of a new Khadi institution from an average of three years to a mere 45 days. 

As many as 143 new institutions have applied for registration for Khadi certification and production using the portal. This will not only boost the production of Khadi, but also expand employment opportunities at the door step in the rural areas and bring new Khadi artisans in the 

KVIC fold. (The writer is a Delhi-based freelance journalist.) “