Santosh Gangwar, Union Minister for Textiles said that the Government is considering to roll out Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS) to the handloom weavers and artisans of the textile sector, so that they are not forced to take up jobs under MNREGS which offers better wages. Dutta Iswalkar of the Textile Labour Union of Mumbai said that as formal decision is yet to be made in this regard, the textile unions trashed the idea calling it short-term. This only shows the short-sightedness of the union textile ministry. Instead of diverting the funds to the handloom workers and artisans, Government must actually support them with higher wages than MNREG.
