Union Textiles Minister Giriraj Singh on Thursday, 2 July 2026 credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership for a record knitwear export milestone achieved by Tiruppur, Tamil Nadu, describing it as proof of India's rising global textile capacity. The minister posted on X that Tiruppur had clocked ₹46,000 crore in knitwear exports in financial year 2025-26, calling it a new chapter in Indian textile history.

Context

In his post, Giriraj Singh wrote — 'तिरुपुर ने वित्त वर्ष 2025-26 में ₹46,000 करोड़ के रिकॉर्ड निटवेयर निर्यात के साथ नया इतिहास रचा है' ['Tiruppur has scripted new history with a record knitwear export of ₹46,000 crore in financial year 2025-26']. He added that the achievement strengthens the resolve to create employment for lakhs of people, grow exports, and make India a global textile hub by 2030. The post was tagged with #Textiles, #Tiruppur, #ViksitBharat2047, and #MakeInIndia.

Policy Backdrop

Tiruppur, located in Tamil Nadu, is India's single largest knitwear and garment export cluster, long regarded as the backbone of the country's apparel trade. The Make in India initiative, launched in September 2014, placed textiles among its priority sectors, aiming to attract investment and deepen India's role in global value chains. A Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for man-made fibres and technical textiles, notified in September 2021, further extended incentives to boost exports and draw fresh capital into the sector.

The Viksit Bharat 2047 vision — the government's blueprint for a developed India by the centenary of Independence — identifies textiles as a key pillar of the manufacturing economy, with the 2030 global textile hub target serving as an intermediate milestone under that broader roadmap.

Stakeholders and Impact

The Tiruppur cluster directly supports hundreds of MSME garment units and employs a large workforce drawn from across Tamil Nadu and neighbouring states. Knitwear exporters in the cluster have benefited from cluster development programmes and trade facilitation measures rolled out over the past decade. Giriraj Singh specifically highlighted employment for 'lakhs of people' as a core outcome of the milestone, underscoring the sector's role as a labour-intensive export engine.

A sustained rise in export values from Tiruppur also signals improving integration into global apparel supply chains at a time when several international buyers are diversifying sourcing away from competing markets.

What's Next

Full FY 2025-26 textile export data from the Ministry of Textiles is expected to provide a comprehensive picture of how other clusters performed alongside Tiruppur. Any mid-term review of the National Textile Policy and parliamentary discussions on PLI disbursements and budget allocations for apparel clusters will be closely watched by industry stakeholders. Achieving the 2030 global textile hub target will require consistent export growth across multiple product categories and geographies beyond knitwear alone.