New Delhi, 30 Nov (KNN) While replying to a question in the Rajya Sabha pertaining to the number of people working in MSMEs who lost their jobs during the pandemic since March, 2020, MSME Minister Narayan Rane said, that the data is not maintained by the government as MSMEs constitute both formal and informal sector.

Lack of data management is sprouting major challenges for the Government to map the MSME sector, as on 12th November, 2021 the Ministry of MSME invited bids to study the sick/closed small business units in the past five years which is expected to be completed in two months.

All the data of registered MSMEs will be sourced through Udyam Portal, Udyog Aadhar Registration and EM-II.

However, the research is being met with bottlenecks due to lack of accuracy in the data stored with not enough information on sick/closed units.

Similarly in September last year, Piyush Goyal Union Minister of Commerce and Industry told Rajya Sabha that the data on the number of startups shut down due to the pandemic is not maintained by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade.