Textile industry has urged the Government to urgently raise customs duty on manmade yarns to 10 per cent, which is currently at 5 per cent.

Northern India Textile Mills’ Association (NITMA) has appealed to the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Textiles to consider this demand immediately in the ensuing Union Budget 2021 for the growth and expansion of domestic MMF industry and for preventing mass level loss of employment.

NITMA issued a press release and said that monthly average imports of virgin polyester spun yarn have increased by 972 per cent from 2015 to 2020.

Imports from Vietnam alone have increased by mammoth 10,512 per cent, that is, 107 times.

Average monthly imports for 2020 are 5,212 tonnes per month out of the total domestic monthly consumption of 22,000 tonnes per month. This means that imports enjoy 25 per cent of the total market share. Moreover, this trend is increasing with great speed.

Sanjay Garg, President, NITMA, elaborated that manmade yarn sector is one of the largest employment generating segments within the textile industry and is a highly capital and labour intensive industry as well.

The unreasonably low-priced imports of manmade yarn into India have been causing considerable amount of injury to domestic manufacturers for last 5 years or so.

Industry has deep concerns over the rise in import quantities being dumped into India, which can potentially cause a permanent damage to the domestic MMF sector with the cascading effect, from closure of units to NPAs, eventually resulting in huge employment loss.