Close to 2.1 lakh bales of 170 kg each of home-grown cotton secured Kasturi Cotton Bharat certification during the trading season that closed on September 30.
This is a sign of how central provenance tracking has become important to India’s textile value chain.
Textile mills and other users report that the blockchain-backed scheme is growing in relevance, with overseas buyers, notably in the United States and Europe, pressing for fuller visibility over their sourcing networks.
Uptake has climbed steeply since the scheme debuted. Certified volumes grew from 47,100 bales in 2023-24 to 2.13 lakh bales in 2025-26, and over 10 lakh bales are now registered on the Kasturi Cotton Bharat blockchain, building a digital audit trail that runs from raw fibre through to the finished product.
The programme’s purpose is to reassure purchasers about where Indian cotton comes from and how good it is.
Participants add that buyers in Western markets, especially the US and Europe, are asking ever more insistently for transparent, traceable supply chains, which is lifting the certification’s standing.
Growth is forecast to continue. Of projected cotton output of 498 lakh bales by 2031-32, roughly 132 lakh bales are expected to meet Kasturi Cotton criteria.
“At present the scheme counts 124 active registered participants, 33 of them textile mills,” The Hindu reported.
Exporters are already seeing commercial benefit. B. Shanmugavadivel, Managing Director of SBT Apparels, said his firm has bought 3,000 bales of long-staple Kasturi Cotton from the Cotton Corporation of India to make garments for shipment abroad.
He argued that Kasturi Cotton outperforms ordinary cotton on quality, while its verifiable lineage carries particular weight in export markets where purchasers increasingly want sourcing they can check. As a result, clothing made with it is being received more favourably, he said.
Kulin Lalbhai, Vice Chairman of Arvind Limited, noted that traceability has become a core element of global textile supply chains, as buyers look for assurance about what they procure.
Introduced in 2020, the Kasturi Cotton initiative has helped put such traceability within reach of the whole industry.
Image courtesy: Business Recorder
