India to soon have a national MSME policy: Mishra

The country will soon have a comprehensive policy for micro, small and medium enterprises, Union Minister Kalraj Mishra said today.

The country does not have an MSME policy till date. A one-member panel of former Cabinet Secretary Prabhat Kumar had submitted a report on formulation of a National MSME Policy to Mishra last month.

"The panel has submitted its report to us. We are currently examining it in consultation with other ministries and will soon put it out in the public domain seeking stakeholders' views," the MSME Minister told reporters.

He said the policy will be unveiled soon.

A senior MSME Ministry official told PTI that other ministries are being consulted on financial implications of the proposed policy, if any.

Besides, over 25 lakh micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) have registered under the simplified Aadhaar-based registration system 'Udyog Aadhaar' introduced in September 2015, Mishra said.

The MSME Ministry has been allocated funds to the tune of Rs 6,482 crore in the Budget, an 87 per cent increase over the previous fiscal's Budget estimate, he said.

Besides, Mishra said the corpus of the Credit Guarantee Trust Fund currently stands at Rs 7,500 crore after fresh allocation of Rs 5,000 crore, as against Rs 2,500 crore earlier.

He pointed out that 27 lakh units have benefited from the fund whereas loans worth Rs 1,23,000 crore have been disbursed by banks.

The minister said the move to reduce corporate tax to 25 per cent for firms having turnover up to Rs 50 crore will encourage MSMEs.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had reduced the income tax for smaller companies with annual turnover up to Rs 50 crore to 25 per cent to make MSME companies more viable and also to encourage firms to migrate to company format.

Unveiling the budgetary proposals for 2017-18, Jaitley had said: "As per the data of assessment year 2015-16, there are 6.94 lakh companies filing returns, out of which 6.67 lakh companies fall in this category. Therefore percentage wise, the 96 per cent companies will get the benefit of this lower taxation.