Short notes on Localisation of cotton textile industry

The localisation of the cotton textile industry is mainly affected by the availability of raw material, proximity of market, capital facility, port facility and cheap and skilled labour. In early days the cotton growing tracts of the Peninsula and Great Plains together with capital and port facilities helped in the concentration of cotton mills in Mumbai, Ahmadabad, Coimbatore, Solapur, Nagpur and Indore. But with the development of modern means of transport and communication an apparent shift was noticed to­wards centers of consumption (market), capital and textile industries Karnataka, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh.

These areas include die Kliandesh region, Gujarat, die Ganga plain and east coastal region of south India. The three southern states of Maharashtra, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu to­gether account for 60 per cent of total mills, 67.41 per cent of the total spindles, and 72.4 per cent of total looms of the country.

These produce 74.69 per cent of cotton cloth and 40.35 per cent of cotton yarns in the country. Outside these states Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh are odier three states which together contribute 14.67 per cent of spindles, 17.30 per cent of looms, 7.22 per cent of yarns and 8.68 per of mill-made cloths in die country.

1. Maharashtra

Maharashtra, with 106 cotton textile mills, equipped with 23.4 per cent of total spindles and 37 per cent of total looms of the country, contributes 11 per cent of mill-made cotton yarns and 39.4 per cent of mill-made cotton cloths in India.

The city of Mumbai is the largest centre of cotton textile in the country housing 56 mills, with 16.4 per cent of the total spindle age and 29.5 per cent of the total loom age in the country. Mumbai, besides being the initial centre of cotton textile, enjoys the facilities of prox­imity of raw materials, skilled labour, capital, and ben­efit of sea port, good transport, and marine climate and nearby market.

The bulk of production is in the form of light textured cloth, long cloth, shirting’s, domestics, and sheeting’s, dhotis and coloured piece-goods. Re­cently the mills have changed over to fine and super fine multi-fiber mixed fabrics and cloths made of artificial fabrics. All these factors have led to the emergence of Mumbai as the most important centre of cotton textile in the country and are rightly called as the ‘cotton polis of India’.

Solapur, lying in the cotton growing area of suds Maharashtra, is die second largest centre with sheeting’s and durries as its specialties Pune, Nagpur and Jalgaon are other important centers.

2. Gujarat

Gujarat has 130 mills with 18.93 per cent of spindles and 30.69 per cent looms of the country. The industry provides employment to over 2.5 lakh workers. The state has a long tradition in cloth weaving. It enjoys facilities of raw cotton, large market, capital, and port and transport facilities. Pres­ently the state contributes about 8.1 per cent of the mill production of cotton yarn and 33.15 per cent of the mill production of cotton cloths in the country.

The city of Ahmadabad alone houses 51 cotton mills installing 12.7 per cent of the spindles and 23 per cent of the total looms of the country. It ranks next to Mumbai in respect of cotton textile industry. It produces sarees and dhotis besides a large variety of grey, bleached, coloured or printed fabrics. Bharuch, Vadodara, Rajkot, Bhavnagar, Kalol, Surat, Cambay, Nandiad, Morvi and Viramgaon are other important centers for cotton textile industry. Surat is an impor­tant Jari producing centre. Surat and Cambay also have large number of power looms.

3. Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu has the largest number of textile mills (215) and accounts for about 5 per cent of the looms and 25 per cent of the spindles of the country. The state is the largest producer of mill made cotton yarns (44.46%) in the country. Besides it is the third largest producer of mill-made cotton cloths (6.69%) in India. Here raw material from the cotton growing tracts of the state, rich pool of skilled labour, cheap hydel power from the Py kara project and expertise in the production of quality textile goods are some of the advantages which have favoured the develop­ment of cotton textile industry in the state. Coimbatore is the leading producer of textile goods (81 mills), followed by Chennai, Madurai, Tirunel velli, Tuticorin, Salem, Virudhnagar, Udmalpet, and Pollachi, etc.

The bulk of production includes sheeting, sarees and other piece goods.

4. Uttar Pradesh

Uttar Pradesh with 50 cotton mills (24 spin­ning and 17 mixed mills) has over 6 per cent of India’s spindle age and loom age capacity and pro­duces 2.11 per cent of mill made cotton yarns and 3.34 per cent of mill made cotton cloths in the country. The state enjoys facilities of large home market, cheap and efficient labour, excellent trans­port facilities and plenty of raw materials from the neighbourhood. Kanpur (14 mills) is the leading centre. Other important centers include Moradabad, Modinagar, Aligarh, Agra, Etawah, Ghaziabad, Bareilly, Hathras, Rampur, Meerut, Varanasi, Maunath Bhanjan, etc… The manufactures include yarn, grey and coloured fabrics, hosiery, carpets, chaddars, dosuti fabrics and tent age.

5. West Bengal

The state has 55 mills with about 5 per cent of country’s capacity of looms and spindles. It contrib­utes about 2 per cent of the total production of mill- made cotton cloths and yarns of the country. The state enjoys locational advantages of vast market, cheapeoal from Raniganj, port facilities of Kolkata, elec­tricity from the D.V.C. network of railways and river ways and cheap labour from the neighborhood for the development of cotton textile industry. Most of the mills are located in 24-Parganas, Haora and Hugli districts. Kolkata is the largest centre followed by Haora, Sodepur, Serampur, Shyamnagar, Murshidabad, Ghoosury, Saikia, Panihati, Maurigram and Fuleshwar etc. Dhoties, Sarees, grey, bleached and coloured or printed goods are the main items of production.

Davangere, Gokak, Gulberga and Chitradurga. It contributes 3.03 per cent of mill made cotton yarn and 0.74 per cent of mill made cotton cloths of the country. Besides the state has also a thriving handloom and power loom industry producing mainly coarse medium yarn and piece goods.

7. Andhra Pradesh

The state has 60 cotton mills of which 39 are spinning mills. It mainly produces cotton yarns (2002-03 production being 82,000 tones or 3.77% of India). Most of these mills are located in the cotton-growing areas of Telangana. The main pro­duction is of handloom piece goods. Hyderabad, Warangal, Guntur, Adoni, Ramagundam, Guntakal, Tirupati are the important centers of the industry.

8. Madhya Pradesh

With a total of 33 mills Madhya Pradesh has potential of 3.54 per cent of spindles and 6.24 per cent of looms of the country. The chief centers are Indore, Gwalior, Ujjain, Nagda, Raipur, Dewas, Bhopal, Jabalpur, Burhanpur, Rajnandgaon, Ratlam and Mandsaur. Most of the production is in coarse and medium varieties of grey and bleached goods.

9. Kerala

Kerala has 29 cotton mills producing about 1.4 per cent of the mill made cotton yarns and 0.65 per cent of the cotton cloths of the country. The cotton yarn is mainly utilised in the state’s cottage and handloom industry. Main centres are Alwaye, Kochi, Alagappanagarand Allappuzha manufactur­ing sheetings and piece goods.

And cloths of India. Important manufacturing centers are Sri Ganganagar, Bhilwara, Jaipur, Udaipur, Kota, Beawar, Pali, Vijainagar, Bhawanimandi and Kishangarh etc.

11. Others

Among other states with important contribu­tion in cotton textile industry mention may be made of Punjab (21 mills located at Amritsar, Ludhiana and Phagwara), Haryana (10 mills at Bhiwani and Hissar), Bihar (6 mills), Orissa (10 mills), Delhi (4 mills) and Pondicherry (5 mills). Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh produce large quantity of long staple cotton which plays significant role in the localisation of the industry in this region.