State Awards Scheme for Handloom Weavers

What is the State Awards Scheme for Handloom Weavers?

State Awards Scheme for Handloom Weavers is a recognition scheme of the Directorate of Handlooms and Textiles, Manipur, under the Department of Textiles, Commerce and Industry, Government of Manipur. The scheme selects outstanding handloom weavers of Manipur through an annual competition and honours them with a cash prize, a certificate and a citation.

According to the Directorate, the scheme follows a clear precedent. The Ministry of Textiles, Government of India confers National Awards on outstanding weavers and artisans as a token of recognition for their contribution and as encouragement to continue in the craft. Manipur instituted its own State Awards on similar lines, so that weavers whose work does not reach the national stage are still recognised within the state.

Recognition is not the only purpose. A State Award functions as a certified mark of quality for the weaver in the market, and it feeds into the Directorate's related Schemes for Awardees (SFA) programme. The Directorate's reasoning for that programme is worth quoting in substance: Manipur has no surplus produce in agriculture, fishery, sericulture or horticulture, but the handloom sector regularly produces surplus fabric, so an awardee weaver is a natural candidate for support to produce at commercial scale.

Who is eligible for the Manipur State Awards for handloom weavers?

You can enter if:

• You are a handloom weaver of Manipur who weaves personally.
• You can submit an original piece of your own work as the competition entry.
• You are a resident of the state, since this is a state award.
• You submit the prescribed entry form within the last date in the year's notification.

You cannot enter, or will be rejected, if:

• You submit work you did not weave yourself. The award is for craftsmanship, and an entry produced by someone else is not eligible.
• You are a trader or dealer in handloom products rather than a weaver.
• You are a handicraft artisan; handicrafts have their own separate State Awards competition, for which the Directorate publishes a distinct notification, most recently for 2025-26.
• You are a weaver from outside Manipur.
• Your entry reaches the Directorate after the notified last date.

How to apply for the State Awards Scheme for Handloom Weavers

1. Watch for the annual notification. The Directorate of Handlooms and Textiles publishes a State Awards competition notification each year on dhtmanipur.mn.gov.in with the year's categories, prize structure and last date.
2. Download the entry form. The prescribed form is published as "Form for State Award of Handloom Weavers" on the Directorate's website, and printed copies are available at the Directorate Complex, Lamphelpat, Imphal West.
3. Weave and prepare your entry piece. It must be your own original work, and should fit the category described in the notification.
4. Fill in the form completely, including your weaver identity details, residence details, Aadhaar number and bank account details with IFSC code — the prize money is paid into the account you give.
5. Submit the form together with the entry piece at the Directorate of Handlooms and Textiles, or at the district collection point named in the notification, before the last date.
6. Collect the acknowledgement and keep it until the results are declared.

How are the awards decided?

Entries are judged on the craftsmanship of the submitted piece. Because the Directorate publishes the categories and the evaluation arrangements afresh in each year's competition notification, the number of awards, the categories and the prize amounts are properly read from that notification rather than assumed from a previous year. This is the single most important practical point for a weaver planning an entry: read the current year's notification before you weave the piece, because the categories decide what will actually be judged.

What happens after a weaver wins a State Award?

An awardee receives the cash prize, certificate and citation, and enters the Directorate's list of state awardees. From that point, the Schemes for Awardees (SFA) route becomes relevant. The Directorate designed SFA around the fact that handloom is the one sector in Manipur producing a regular surplus, and it supports awardee weavers in scaling their production commercially rather than leaving the award as a one-time honour.

An awardee should therefore approach the Directorate after the award ceremony to ask what awardee-specific support is open in the current year, instead of waiting to be contacted.

What is not published about this scheme

• A permanent cash prize figure. The amount is set in each year's notification, and any figure circulating without a notification behind it should be treated as unconfirmed.
• The fixed number of awards per year.
• Past awardee lists in a consolidated form, though the Directorate maintains an Awardees section on its website.

Where the State Awards sit among Manipur's handloom schemes

State Awards Scheme for Handloom Weavers is a State Plan scheme of the Directorate, alongside the Yarn Scheme's 20 per cent subsidy, the Loom Upgradation Scheme, the Dyeing and Printing Scheme, the Cotton Plantation Scheme, the Handloom and Handicrafts Home Delivery Scheme, Schemes for Awardees, the Handloom Export Development Approach and the Manipur International Textile Expo (MANITEX).

Read together, those schemes form a chain: subsidised yarn and an upgraded loom at the input end, dyeing and printing in the middle, and awards, expos and export development at the recognition and marketing end. The State Awards are the point in that chain where the department identifies which weavers are worth backing at commercial scale.

The Directorate also implements large centrally funded programmes in parallel, 51 Cluster Development Projects under NERTPS covering 21,073 beneficiaries at a cost of Rs 3,001.35 lakh, Block Level Clusters under NHDP worth Rs 1,621.64 lakh, and skill development of 25,000 persons under SAMARTH worth Rs 2,500 lakh. A weaver working within one of those clusters is fully entitled to enter the State Awards competition; the two are separate tracks.

Handicraft artisans have their own parallel award, notified separately, most recently for the 2025-26 competition.

Where to get help

Directorate of Handlooms and Textiles, Manipur Directorate Complex, Lamphelpat, Imphal West Phone: +91 385 2410687 Email: support@dhtmanipur.com

Forms and competition notifications are published on dhtmanipur.mn.gov.in under Notifications and Downloads. As of August 2026 parts of that site were unavailable, so a weaver who cannot reach the form online should collect it in person from the Directorate. No fee is payable to any intermediary for entering the State Awards competition.

How to check your application status

The State Awards competition does not run through an online application tracker, so a weaver has to follow up the way the Directorate actually processes entries: on paper, by phone, and by watching the notification calendar.

1. Keep the acknowledgement you were given at submission. When you hand in the entry form and the woven piece at the Directorate of Handlooms and Textiles or at the district collection point, ask for a signed or stamped acknowledgement. This slip is your only proof of submission, and you will need to quote its details (your name, weaver ID or entry number, and date of submission) in any later follow-up.
2. Call the Directorate helpline for a status update. The Directorate of Handlooms and Textiles at Directorate Complex, Lamphelpat, Imphal West, can be reached at +91 385 2410687. Quote the acknowledgement details when you call, since the office maintains entries by district and category rather than by a searchable online ID.
3. Write to the Directorate by email if a phone call is not possible. support@dhtmanipur.com is the contact address published for the Directorate; mention your acknowledgement number and the year's notification in the subject line so the query can be matched to the right competition cycle.
4. Watch dhtmanipur.mn.gov.in for the results announcement. Judging happens after the notified last date closes, and results are announced through a fresh notification or press release on the same channel that carried the original call for entries. As of August 2026 parts of the Directorate's website were intermittently unavailable, so a weaver who cannot load the results page online should call or visit in person rather than assume no result means no award.
5. Visit the Directorate Complex in person if you have not heard back. Because there is no digital dashboard for this scheme, an in-person enquiry at Lamphelpat, Imphal West, carrying your acknowledgement slip, is often the fastest way to confirm whether your entry reached the judging stage.

There is no SMS or portal login for this scheme, so do not expect an automated update; the acknowledgement slip and a direct call or visit remain the only reliable ways to track an entry.

Common reasons for rejection

• The entry was not the applicant's own original work. The award is for personal craftsmanship, so a piece woven, in whole or part, by someone else does not qualify. Submit only a piece you wove yourself, and be prepared to speak to how you made it if asked.
• The applicant is a trader or dealer, not a weaver. Entries are open to practising handloom weavers, not to those who buy and sell handloom products without weaving themselves. If your role is trading rather than weaving, this competition is not the right one for you.
• A handicraft artisan applied under the weavers' competition. Handicrafts have a separate State Awards competition with its own notification. An artisan's entry submitted against the weavers' notification will be rejected as out of category; check which notification, handloom or handicraft, matches your craft before you apply.
• The entry or form arrived after the notified last date. The Directorate fixes a firm last date in each year's notification, and late entries are not judged. Submit well before the deadline rather than on the closing day, since postal or courier delays to Lamphelpat are not the Directorate's responsibility.
• The applicant is not a resident weaver of Manipur. This is a state award restricted to Manipur's weavers; entries from weavers based outside the state do not qualify.
• The form was incomplete, particularly the bank account and IFSC details. Prize money is paid directly into the bank account given on the form, so a missing or mismatched account number, IFSC code, or Aadhaar number can hold up or disqualify an otherwise winning entry. Fill every field on the prescribed form before submitting, and double-check the bank details against your passbook or bank statement.
• The entry did not fit the year's published categories. Since categories, and what is judged in each, are set afresh in every year's notification, an entry prepared against an old year's categories can fall outside what the current competition is judging. Read the current notification before you weave the piece, not after.