Sakthivel Writes to Raghuram on Rupee Gain

The Rs 17,800 crore knitwear industry in Tirupur on 19 May urged RBI Governor to intervene in the currency market and arrest the Rupee gains for the interest of country’s exports.

In a letter to the RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan, Tirupur Exporters Association (TEA’s) President A Sakthivel said that after the Lok Sabha results, the Rupee has been gaining against Dollar on a daily basis and on Monday morning it touched Rs 58.57 per dollar and is widely expected that the Rupee gain will continue in the coming days also, which may not overall augur well for the knitwear exporters of Tirupur.

He said that, India’s main competing country China is maintaining its competitive advantage by calibrating their currency and other country Bangladesh, being a least developed country, has an advantage as zero customs tariff in the European market.

According to Sakthivel, in 2013-14, the industry exported $2.95 billion worth of goods, as compared to $2.52 billion in 2012-13.

Mr. Sakthivel said that the reasons for growth include, increased manufacturing cost in China, which went up around 15-18%, non compliances factories in Bangladesh as compared to more than 95% compliances factories in Tirupur, fall in Rupee value, increased purchasing power in EU market, revival of US market and penetration into new markets.