The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Tiruchi News : No takers for five shops at `Rural Mart'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 23, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Tiruchi

No takers for five shops at `Rural Mart'

By M. Balaganessin

TIRUCHI, FEB. 22. At least five out of a total of 11 shops at the `Rural Mart' in the Cantonment area here, allotted to women self-help groups for marketing their products, are yet to be put to use for want of takers.

The building was constructed by the District Rural Development Agency under `Sampoorna Gramin Swarojgar Yojana' and was declared open in January 2003. It houses six shops facing the busy Bharathidasan Salai on the southern side while the other five shops are located at its backyard.

Considering the fact that the Cantonment area is one of the commercial centres in the city, officials expected full occupancy of the complex. But their hopes were belied due to various factors, primarily due to absence of attractive products from the SHGs and lack of entrepreneurship from the part of SHG members.

All is not well with the existing occupants at the six shops who register a poor monthly business turnover. In fact, one of the shops had been allotted to `Mahalir Thittam,' which has set up a browsing centre. One of the salespersons pointed out that she sold readymade garments produced by SHGs in different parts of the State. Another shop marketed bed sheets brought from Erode and other places.

The first floor of the complex houses a conference hall where functions and training programmes are held from time to time. The salespersons say some snack stalls should be opened to attract the people to the SHG shops.

The Project Officer, DRDA, M. Manohara Singh, conceded there were no takers for a few shops. He was confident that the business would pick up shortly. "In fact, many private traders have approached us offering attractive rent for the shops. But we have earmarked them for marketing SHG products."

The DRDA has planned to permit the SHGs to start ice cream parlours at select points in the city in a few weeks. One of the parlours would be set up at the Mart. The `Mahalir Thittam' Project Officer, G. Jayalakshmi, said an additional computer would be provided at the browsing centre at the Mart. A trained SHG member would be posted to man it.

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