Defence innovation centre to come up in Coimbatore

COIMBATORE: Union minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday unveiled the Centre’s plan to set up a defence manufacturing innovation centre in the city and said she has asked the secretary of defence production to sanction Rs 20 crore for the purpose. The innovation centre is proposed to be set up at CODISSIA Trade Fair Complex here.

This has been a long pending demand from the micro, small and medium entrepreneurs (MSMEs) in the city. Many of them are in the business of manufacturing and supplying parts for defence purposes.

Speaking at an interactive session with the representatives of MSMEs at CODISSIA, the defence minister said this was just a beginning. “We will continue in such a way that you (entrepreneurs) are able to have common testing facilities, testing labs and trial grounds so that you can demonstrate your products to the defence sector and ask them to test,” Sitharaman said.


The minister said in today’s scenario, there was no need for a mother unit for MSMEs to develop. “We have to outgrow such realities. A conglomerate of MSMEs can break the myth that only big firms and corporates can make it big,” she said.

Meanwhile, speaking at the 29th convocation of Avinashilingam Institute for Home Science and Higher Education for Women in Coimbatore, Sitharaman said the UGC should focus more on quality of education than the revenue or fees institutions received.

She added that she always felt that one-size-fitsall principle does not work. “If the UGC comes up with a set of rules and norms which is done in the broad interest of promoting education, it should also allow a degree of flexibility for the universities and institutions,” she said.