The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs on Wednesday said that the PM Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) scheme has received a considerable number of applications for working capital loans. It said that the number of loan sanctions and applications received under the scheme crossed the 1 lakh-mark and the 5 lakh-mark, respectively.

"The micro-credit support under the scheme is expected to provide not only major relief to such vendors but also help them climb the economic ladder. Use of an integrated IT Platform (pmsvanidhi.mohua.org.in), Web Portal and Mobile App, has enabled the scheme to extend its reach and benefits to this segment of society with the objective of minimum government and maximum governance," an official statement added.

The scheme, launched on July 2, aims at facilitating collateral-free working capital loans up to ₹10,000 of 1 year tenure to about 50 lakh street vendors in the urban areas, including those from the surrounding peri-urban/ rural areas, to resume their businesses post Covid-19 lockdown. "Incentives in the form of interest subsidy @ 7% per annum on regular repayment of loan, cashback up to ₹1,200 per annum on undertaking prescribed digital transactions and eligibility for enhanced next tranche of loan have also been provided," it added.

Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) is the implementation partner for the scheme.

"PM SVANidhi Scheme envisages bringing ‘banks at the door steps’ of these ‘nano-entrepreneurs’ by engaging the non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) and the micro-finance institutions (MFIs) as lending institutions, in addition to scheduled commercial banks, public and private, regional rural banks, co-operative banks, SHG banks etc," the statement added.

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