The union ministry of textiles has sanctioned a grant of Rs 24.5 crore to the city-based Institute of Chemical Technology (ICT) to set up National Centre of Excellence (NCE) in Sportech.

The NCE Sportech will research and develop textile technologies related to various sports.

Vice-chancellor and director of ICT Prof Y D Yadav told PTI on Tuesday that the Sportech NCE will run with industrial partners, including Reliance Industries Ltd, Kemrock Industries (Vadodara) and Kusumgar Associates (Mumbai).

Besides these companies, JCT Industries (Ludhiana), which manufactures a lot of sportswear for different brands, has shown interest in the NCE. Textile Committee will assist ICT in organising seminars all over India and collect samples from different areas, if required.

"This is the first time the ministry has given grants to ICT, despite its stellar performance over the years," Yadav said.

"Textile Association has agreed to organise seminars and conferences with ICT in 27 different units in various parts of the country. Texan Laboratory has also shown interest in assisting the COE with standardisation of various testing processes," Yadav said.

The textile chemistry section of ICT was founded in 1933, along with the chemical engineering section, by Sir Vithal Chandavarkar, former vice chancellor of University of Mumbai.

It was recommended by Sir Visvasarayya Committee of the province of Bombay. This has now grown into a full fledged department of fibres and textiles processing technology.

He added that currently very eminent faculty- M D Teli, S R Shukla and R V Adivarekar are at the forefront in textile related research. This centre of excellence will rejuvenate this field and make textiles a glamorous field again.