Vishwakarma scheme for artisans can be a game changer but with a few tweaks

livemint.com:

Narendra Modi in his Independence Day speech on 15 August and rubber-stamped by the Union cabinet a day later, arguably marks a watershed in the development of India’s vast, almost entirely unorganized and hugely underserved traditional skills and crafts sector. With an outlay of ₹13,000 crore spread over five years, it aims to provide loan assistance of up to ₹3 lakh in two tranches, at a concessional interest rate of 5% per annum.

While primarily a financing plan, the Vishwakarma scheme also plans to provide skill upgradation, tool-kit sops, incentives for digital transactions and marketing support to traditional craftspersons. The scheme is targeted at 18 traditional craftspeople: carpenters, boat makers, armourers, blacksmiths, hammer and tool kit makers, locksmiths, goldsmiths, potters, sculptors, stone breakers, cobblers/shoesmiths/footwear artisans, mason basket/mat/broom makers/coir weavers, traditional doll & toy makers, barbers, garland makes, washermen, tailors, and fishing net makers.

Coming in the run-up to the general elections scheduled April-May, the political motive is clear here. The 18 identified crafts are pursued by artisans largely belonging to Scheduled Castes, Schedule Tribes, and OBCs, a large vote bank.

In fact, the Development Commissioner for Handicrafts, the government’s nodal agency for craft and artisan-based activities, lists as many as 72 crafts under its “Pehchaan" scheme, which provides and identity card for traditional craftspersons and artisans, which is a pre-requisite for availing of existing assistance programmes. But the politics of the scheme are irrelevant to the actual benefits of the scheme, and indeed, irrelevant to the pressing need for such assistance.