Centre plans to set up Defense Manufacturing Innovation Centre

Coimbatore, Jan 08: The Union minister for defense Nirmala Sitharaman has announced on Sunday that the centre has decided to set up a defense manufacturing innovation centre in Coimbatore.

The minister said she had asked the secretary of defense production to sanction Rs 20 crore for the purpose. The innovation center is proposed to be set up at Codissia Trade Fair Complex in the city.

This has been a long-pending demand of micro small and medium entrepreneurs in the city. Several manufacturing sectors in the city have been making and supplying parts for defense purposes. Entrepreneurs in the city have been asking for a public sector unit in the city.

Speaking at an interactive session with representatives of MSMEs at Codissia, the minister said this fund was just the beginning. "We will continue in such a way that you (entrepreneurs in the city) should be able to gradually have common testing facilities, testing labs and trial grounds. So that you can demonstrate your products to the defense sector and ask them to test," Sitharaman said.

She said in today's scenario, there was no necessity for a mother unit for MSMEs to develop. "We have to outgrow such realities," she said.