Tirupur’s textile industry has set a target of exports worth Rs 40,000 crores this year. The industry had to face a series of downs due to: Brexit, demonetisation and GST. In fact, GST has hit all industries hard. In the case of textiles, there were anomalies, especially the 18 per cent tax levied on job work. This was later reduced to five per cent and brought on par with other jobs like dyeing and compacting. Otherwise, the survival of the industry, especially knitwear, would have been a question mark.

Since knitwear industry has to handle cash every week for disbursing wages, operations were hit after demonetisation. But soon Tirupur bounced back following other modes of transaction. The industry fell Rs 4,000 crores short of its target Rs 30,000 crores. But the prime reason was Brexit because the international value of the pound fell by 25 per cent.

Half of the knitwear exports from India are contributed by Tirupur. But in the last five years, domestic business has grown five times faster than exports. This has happened because of a huge rise in demand for dresses. The average Indian changes clothes four times a day.