Gadkari ropes in top designers to give khadi a makeover

Union Minister Nitin Gadkari brainstormed with ace fashion designers, including Ritu Beri, Rohit Bal, Raghavendra Rathore, and J J Valaya, and top officials on Wednesday to weave the success story around khadi and make it a trendy-yet-affordable fabric globally. 

The Khadi and Village Industries Corporation (KVIC), under the ministry of micro, small and medium enterprises, proposes to establish centres across the country to facilitate khadi institutions to develop designs according to market demand. 

"We will formulate a scheme on how we can popularise and make a success story out of khadi -- the essence of Gandhiji's views, a symbol of our self sustenance having immense job creation potential. We will direct all efforts from the government's side towards achieving this objective," Gadkari told reporters after the meeting. 

The Union minister for MSME and Road Transport & Highways discussed the modalities and way forward in this regard. 

Speaking on the occasion, Gadkari said that in order to maximise the production and sale of khadi and make it a global brand, there is a need to make its designs more trendy and modern, without compromising with tradition. 

He said we needed to make khadi attractive for the youth of the country. The product designs should be aligned to customer choices and demand, and take into account local and regional preferences and requirements such as weather condition. 

Besides, the minister said he wants the turnover of KVIC to touch Rs 10,000 crore from the current Rs 3,200 crore in next five years. 

While KVIC's proposal is to set up four design houses -- one each in the eastern, western, northern, southern parts of the country, besides one in the north east. These could be on a build-operate-transfer mode or on a outsourcing basis. However, these issues would be worked out in further meetings and discussions. 

"The second meeting will be held in the first week of October. After that, we will be in a position to chalk out the exact policy," KVIC Chairman Vinai Kumar Saxena told PTI. 

Sources said the designers present in the meeting will submit their individual proposals shortly to the MSME ministry entailing suggestions to set up design centres. 

The proposed design centres will facilitate khadi institutions to develop products according to market demand. The primary role of a design centre will be to identify the latest trends, adopt them as per customer needs and undertake various testing and review activities for translating them into production. 

Senior officials from the ministries of MSME and textiles, KVIC, National Institute of Design, National Institute of Fashion Technology attended the meeting.