Union Minister Piyush Goyal chaired the 7th meeting of the Mission Steering Group for the National Technical Textiles Mission. During this meeting, 18 R&D projects valued at Rs. 46.74 crore (US$ 5.62 million) received approval. These projects span various categories, including Geotech, Protech, Indutech, Sustainable Textiles, Sportech, Smart E-Textiles, and Meditech. Goyal emphasized the need for proactive industry engagement to bolster India’s indigenous development of technical textiles.
The minister also discussed the status of various components of the National Technical Textiles Mission, including the review of sanctioned R&D products, R&D projects in Mission mode, the formation of a committee for Startups in Technical Textiles under guidelines, and certain outreach activities and events.
Goyal highlighted the importance of focusing on research and development for globally heavily imported technological textile products in addition to import-dependent technical textiles and specialty fibers in India.
Furthermore, the meeting included a review of progress in the areas of education, training, and skill development. A total of 26 applications, amounting to Rs. 151.02 crore (US$ 18.16 million), from 15 public and 11 private institutions were approved for the introduction of papers, the purchase of laboratory infrastructure, and the training of trainers across various technical textile application areas.
Among the 18 authorized R&D projects were 14 high-value initiatives, three prototype grant projects, and one ideation grant project. These projects covered various application areas of technical textiles, including Geotech, Protech, Indutech, Sportech, Sustainable Textiles, Meditech, Smart & E-Textiles, and Geotextiles. Institutes and research agencies like BTRA, ATIRA, IIT Delhi, IIT Jammu, NIT Jalandhar, IIT Kharagpur, CSIR New Delhi, and IIT Madras led these authorized projects.
