Khadi raises Rs 50,000 crore in sales in India

With Prime Minister Narendra Modi pushing for khadi, the sector has raised Rs 50,000 crore in sales last year. Modi in his famous 'Mann Ki Baat' radio programme said that sale of khadi products had gone up by almost 125 per cent. Demand for products like honey, soaps, cosmetics, furniture and food items has been increasing, according to media reports. 
 
"I was told that khadi sales increased by almost 125 per cent," Modi said on the Mann Ki Baat programme on All India Radio, according to an agency report.

According to the figures released by Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC), during the last financial year, sales of village industries produce, or Gramodyog, grew by 24 per cent to just under Rs 50,000 crore. The khadi products raised sales of Rs 2,005 crore, 33 per cent more than Rs 1,635 crore in 2015-16. 
 
The combined sales by the KVIC was even larger than several consumer goods companies in the country while khadi sales alone may be close to that of companies like Bombay Dyeing and Raymond, which are yet to disclose numbers for the last financial year, the reports said. KVIC has now set a target of more than doubling khadi products sales to Rs 5,000 crore by 2018-19. 

The reports said that more and more institutions are now willing to use khadi products with the government hospitals too, soon going for khadi bed-sheets, dressing towels, surgeon gowns and herbal shampoos.

"We are expecting orders worth around Rs 150 crore from government hospitals under the Union Health Ministry spread across the country in the current financial year," KVIC Chairman Vinai Kumar Saxena was quoted as saying. 
 
Recently, Khadi India had threatened to sue Fabindia, a chain of ethnic wear retail outlets, for allegedly indulging in "unfair trade practice" by selling its cotton products unauthorisedly under the registered brand name "Khadi". KVIC had sent a legal notice to Fabindia in this regard.
 
Union minister Kalraj Mishra had said that engaging people through khadi industry could even help uproot terrorism following massive response to the first ever national exhibition organised by the KVIC in Jammu and Kashmir last year.