ECLGS for MSMEs: Disbursement jumps over 1600% under Modi govt’s pet scheme for small business credit

The ECLGS Fund was registered on May 26, 2020.

Credit and Finance for MSMEs: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s office on Thursday, updating on the progress of the Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS) for MSMEs, said Rs 68,311.55 crore has already been disbursed as of July 15, 2020. This is up 1655 per cent from Rs 3,892 crore disbursed as of June 1. According to the data tweeted by FM Sitharaman’s office, the total sanctioned amount stood at Rs 1,23,345.16 crore. On the other hand, the number of MSME accounts disbursed with credit was 17,98,336 out of 37,26,238 sanctioned. Public sector banks (PSB) continued to have a majority share in the amount sanctioned and disbursed. While private banks disbursed only Rs 26,492.36 crore, PSBs had given Rs 41,819.19 crore to eligible MSMEs. Likewise, PSB had sanctioned Rs 69,135.19 crore in comparison to Rs 54,209.97 sanctioned by private banks as of July 15.

“Compared to 9 July 2020, there is an increase of Rs 3,245.79 crore in the cumulative amount of loans sanctioned & an increase of Rs 6,323.65 crore in the cumulative amount of loans disbursed, by both #PSBs and private sector banks combined as on 15 July 2020,” Finance Minister’s office tweeted.

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State Bank of India remained the leading lender with Rs 14,362.68 crore disbursed followed by Rs 5,298.71 disbursed by Canara Bank, Rs 4,057.77 by Bank of Baroda, Rs 4,032.58 by Punjab National Bank, and Rs 3,960.92 by Union Bank of India in the tally for top five PSBs. However, in terms of the number of MSME accounts disbursed with credit, Canara Bank was marginally up from SBI. While Canara Bank supported 3,07,670 MSME accounts, SBI had lent to 2,99,375 accounts. Bank of India, Union Bank of India, and Central Bank of India were other top PSBs to provide credit to MSMEs under the collateral-free scheme.

FM Sitharaman had announced in May working capital support of 20 per cent of the outstanding credit for MSMEs as on February 29, 2020, in the form of term loans at a concessional interest rate. MSMEs with up to Rs 25 crore outstanding and turnover of up to Rs 100 crore are eligible. The Department of Financial Services had issued operational guidelines for the ECLGS scheme on May 23 after the Cabinet’s approval on May 20, 2020. The ECLGS Fund was registered on May 26, 2020.