The Tamil Nadu textile and apparel industry should leverage the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for technical textiles and manmade fibre sector for which the Union government has allocated ₹11,000 crore, said Union Textile Minister Giriraj Singh in Tiruppur on Sunday.

Speaking at a meeting organised by the Tiruppur Exporters Association (TEA), he said the Centre has relaxed the norms for the PLI scheme to encourage investments in technical textiles and MMF sectors.

“As for the new schemes planned by the Ministry, some have gone to the Cabinet, and others will follow—they are designed to be pro-industry. We have factored in everything—machinery, employment, and other aspects. I hope that the State and the Centre will work together,” he said.

The Minister also urged the industry to look at investing in States where there is labour availability.

When Prime Minister Narendra Modi took office in 2014, silk production stood at 26,000 tonnes annually. It is 43,000 tonnes now and by 2030 it will be 60,000 tonnes. India should export more silk-based garments that are blended with other fibres, he added.

A. Sakthivel, chairman of the Apparel Export Promotion Council, said that the Textile Ministry is introducing new initiatives every two months and all the seven PM MITRA parks were now operational.

According to K.M. Subramanian, president of the TEA, the government should look at early implementation of the Textile Expansion and Employment Scheme (TEEM) and extend benefits under the Rebate of State and Central Taxes and Levies for three more years.

 Later, the Minister interacted with textile machinery manufacturers and had a meeting with officials of the South India Textile Research Association (SITRA) in Coimbatore. Responding to the demand to extend benefits under the TEEM scheme for the spinning and cotton ginning machines, he asked the industry for details so that the Ministry can study it.

The industry in Tamil Nadu should look at tripling exports, he said and called for investments to make indigenous machinery for knitting, weaving, and processing sectors.

The Minister also inaugurated a GM Testing Laboratory for cotton and cotton-derived materials at SITRA. The laboratory will meet the growing need for traceability, quality assurance, and compliance in the global cotton trade. It will help exporters meet requirements of organic standards such as GOTS and OCS, which mandate qualitative GM cotton screening.

The laboratory has obtained its NABL accreditation in the recent assessment.