Fruit, veggie sellers avail of 46% of vendors’ loan

MUMBAI/NEW DELHI: The finance ministry asked banks in a meeting with the lenders on Friday to speed up disbursement of loans under the PM Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) scheme. As part of this, any street vendor registered with an urban body is eligible for a collateral-free loan of Rs 10,000.
The government has put in place an online platform where it can get a view on the status of all loans disbursed under the scheme. Although the PM SVANidhi — aimed at benefiting 50 lakh street vendors — was announced by the finance minister, it is being operationalised through a tie-up between the housing & urban affairs ministry and Sidbi. As against the targeted 50 lakh, only 21 lakh applications have been collected, 9 lakh loans sanctioned and 2.7 lakh disbursed.

Street vendors selling fruits and vegetables have the maximum share of 46% of total 21.64 lakh loan applications that the banks and financing agencies have received under the scheme. Women vendors comprise 40% of all the applications received till Sunday.
The official data show that Varanasi Municipal Corporation leads the list of municipal areas where 10,000 vendors have got the loan followed by Indore (7,838) and Bhopal (7,483). A total of only 271 street vendors have got the loan in Delhi, which has four municipal bodies and one cantonment area.
The total disbursed amount is Rs 266 crore. SBI tops the list with 5.2 lakh applications and 75,000 sanctioned loans, followed by Union Bank which has received 2.2 lakh applications and has sanctioned 45,000. Others in the top five are Bank of India, Canara Bank and Central Bank.
Among all states and UTs, a maximum of 1.19 lakh applicants have got the loan where bypolls are scheduled for 28 seats. Telangana has the second highest such applications (44,000) followed by Uttar Pradesh (43,200).
The scheme provides for incentives in the form of interest subsidy at 7% per annum on regular repayment of loan and cash-back upto Rs 1,200 per annum on undertaking prescribed digital transactions.
Moreover, on timely or early repayment, the vendors will be eligible for the next cycle of working capital loan with an enhanced limit.