PM SVANidhi Scheme for Street Vendors

• PM SVANidhi is a Central Sector Scheme.
• Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs is implementing Pradhan Mantri Street Vendors’ Atma Nirbhar Nidhi Scheme (PM SVANidhi) since June 01, 2020, to facilitate the working capital loan of up? 10,000 of 1-year tenure to Street Vendors, vending in urban areas, to resume their businesses, adversely impacted by the pandemic.

• On prepayment or repayment, they are eligible for an enhanced working capital loan of upto ?20,000 and ?50,000 in the second and third tranches respectively.
• In addition, ‘SVANidhi se Samriddhi’ initiative, designed to build safety net for the beneficiaries’ families by linking them to existing socio-economic welfare schemes of Government of India. It was launched in January 2021 for 125 select cities.
• As on July 26, 2021, 43.1 lakh loan applications have been received, out of these 25.2 lakh loans have been sanctioned and 22.7 lakh loans amounting to ?2,243 crore have been disbursed.
• In addition, Socio-economic profiling of 5.1 lakh beneficiaries along with their family members has been completed and 1.5 lakh scheme benefits have been extended.
• This scheme targets to benefit over 50 lakh Street Vendors.
• On timely/ early repayment of the loan, an interest subsidy @ 7% per annum will be credited to the bank accounts of beneficiaries through Direct Benefit Transfer on quarterly basis.
• There will be no penalty on early repayment of loan.
• The scheme promotes digital transactions through cash back incentives up to an amount of Rs. 100 per month.
• Street Vendors engaged in vending in urban areas as on or before March 24, 2020 are eligible for benefit under PM SVANidhi Scheme.
• The eligible vendors are identified as per following criteria:

1. Street vendors in possession of Certificate of Vending / Identity Card issued by Urban Local Bodies (ULBs);
2. The vendors, who have been identified in the survey but have not been issued Certificate of Vending / Identity Card;
3. Street Vendors, left out of the ULB led identification survey or who have started vending after completion of the survey and have been issued Letter of Recommendation (LoR) to that effect by the ULB / Town Vending Committee (TVC); and
4. The vendors of surrounding development/ peri-urban / rural areas vending in the geographical limits of the ULBs and have been issued Letter of Recommendation (LoR) to that effect by the ULB / TVC.

MoHUA – SIDBI MoU

• A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed between Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs and Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), in order to engage SIDBI as the Implementation Agency for PM Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) - a Special Micro-Credit Facility for Street Vendors.
• SIDBI will implement the PM SVANidhi Scheme under the guidance of MoHUA.
• It will also manage the credit guarantee to the lending institutions through Credit Guarantee Fund Trust for Micro and Small Enterprises (CGTMSE).
• It will develop and maintain a customized and integrated IT Platform providing end-to-end solutions, including documentation of all the processes and workflows for an end-to-end solution, through a Portal and a Mobile App, to ensure engagement and information flow between Urban Local Bodies (ULBs), Lending Institutions, Digital Payment Aggregators and other stakeholders.
• It will leverage the network of lending Institutions like Scheduled Commercials Banks (SCBs), Non-Bank Finance Companies (NBFCs), Micro Finance Institutions (MFIs), Co-operative Banks, Small Finance Banks (SFBs), Regional Rural Banks (RRBs), etc. for the Scheme implementation.
• With a view to ensure effective implementation, SIDBI shall also provide a Project Management Unit (PMU), comprising of domain experts in training/ capacity building, project and platform management, Information Education and Communication (IEC), banking, NBFC and MFI sectors etc., for the period of PM SVANidhi i.e. upto March 2022.

Special drive for Digital onboarding of street vendors

• Pilot run of the ‘special drive for Digital onboarding of street vendors under PM SVANidhischeme’was launched today.
• The drive launched today is in line with Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi’s vision of “Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas”.
• The special drive aims to accelerate on-boarding of street vendors on the UPI QR code and handhold them to start accepting/making digital payment transactions.
• Five major aggregators including Paytm, Phone Pe, Bharat Pe, Mswipe and Aceware have agreed to participate in 45 days special drive for digitally onboarding the street vendors with BHIM-UPI QR code on pro-bono basis.
• The drive will cover 223 cities across the country with around 8,68,184 street vendors to be onboarded under various urban local bodies.
• Digital Payment Aggregators will educate the street vendors about the benefits of digital payments such as convenience, increased operational efficiency, seamless transfer of funds, cost saving, transparency and security.
• They will also hand hold the street vendors by performing penny drop transaction and any further support that is required to accept/ pay digitally.
• Digital footprints including digital payment transactions and loan repayment data under the scheme would help in credit profiling of street vendors.
• This will enable inclusion of street vendors in the formal credit ecosystem, and help in driving financial inclusion of unorganized sector.
• This will enable inclusion of Street Vendors in the formal credit ecosystem, and help in driving financial inclusion of the unorganized sector.
• In recent years, a significant rise in use of digital payments has been observed.
• Contactless digital payment modes including BHIM UPI, Rupay contactless etc, has significant role to facilitate social distancing, for prevention of Covid-19.
• The Covid-19 pandemic has catazalyzed behavioural changes in citizens for adoption of digital payments, as reflected in the tremendous growth in BHIM UPI transactions from 99.95 crore in April 2020 to 355.55 crore in August-2021.
• During the coronavirus crisis, digital payments, particularly BHIM UPI has played a significant role in keeping economy running by supporting commerce and business.