Empowering Street Vendors Through PM Street Vendor Yojana
PM Street Vendor Yojana incentivises transactions made through digital mediums by the people who belong to the street vendor community in India. It is only one of the few ways through which it empowers the members of the street vendor community of India. But first, let us take a look at what PM Street Vendor’s Yojana is about. Read on to know more.
PM SVANidhi scheme: An Overview
The Pradhan Mantri Street Vendor's AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) scheme was introduced and subsequently put into place in order to ensure the empowering of the localised perishable service providers that set up shop on the streets of India. It intends to do the same by advancing loans that must go towards their working capital expenses to them. Additionally, through the PM Street Vendor Loan yojana, the government intends on acting as a catalyst for the holistic development of the street vendors, their overall upliftment in economic terms and the prompt resuming of their business practices. Such a scheme is indeed the need of the hour, considering the on-pandemic has practically financially handicapped the street vendor brethren.
On the subject of loan advancements, the same is provided to the street vendors so that they can meet their working capital needs. Such loans are collateral-free in nature and the principal amount of the same can go up to as high as ₹20,000. As a part of the initiative, the government intends on providing such loan sanctions to approximately 5 million street vendors which are residing in the subcontinent.
And now that you have understood what the scheme in question actually is, let us take a look at the ways in which the government plans on empowering the members of the street vendor brethren through the scheme. What you will find below is a list of the approved mediums of digital payment platforms, usage of which would entitle the members of the street vendor community to several forms of incentives.
List of approved payment methods
Amazon Pay
RuPay Debit Cards
BharatPe
Google Pay
PhonePe
UPI QR codes belonging to payment aggregators
Additional Benefits of the Street Vendors Loan Yojana
The government, as a part of the Street Vendors Loan Yojana, also intends on empowering the members of the street vendor community through interest subsidies and cashback offers. Their specifics can be found below.
Interest subsidy @7% per annum on regular repayment of the loan for street vendors.
Cashback up to ₹1,200 per annum on undertaking transactional activities through approved digital payment/receipt mediums.
If you are a street vendor who is trying to get back on your feet in such trying times, you can become a beneficiary of the PM SVANidhi scheme. The overall goal of the scheme in question is the empowerment of the members of the street vendor community by way of micro loans as well as cashback facilities, amongst other things. All you will need to do is meet the laid-out eligibility criteria and have a set of basic documents pertaining to your identity as well as your business while applying for the benefits provided under the PM Street Vendor Yojana.
If you would now like to know more about the history of PM Street Vendor’s Yojana, you will find the information down below very useful. In addition to the same, the following paragraphs will also take you through the significance of government-run initiatives like these. Read on to know more.
What sort of interest rates will the street vendors loan be given to the brethren
It must be noted that only a select number of banks and financial institutions can provide you with the street vendor loans and other benefits which are provided under the PM SVANidhi Yojana. What you will find below is a list of those approved banks and financial institutions. Read on to know more.
Banks/Financial Institutions authorised to give out street vendor loans
Scheduled Commercial Banks (SCBs)
Regional Rural Banks (The RRBs)
Small Finance Banks (SFBs)
Cooperative Banks
SHG Banks
Select NBFCs, and
NBFC-MFIs
Note that the interest rates will be dependent on the factors such as RBI policies, prevailing interest rates and other extraneous factors pertaining to the Indian economy. Otherwise, you can always take a MSME loan from one of the lending partners of Bajaj Markets.
A little about the PM SVANidhi Mobile app
In order to make the services of the PM Street Vendor Yojana accessible to the street vendors, the Indian government made a mobile application under the name of the initiative on the Google Play Store for the street vendors back in July of 2020, the year of the coronavirus pandemic. It is recommended for every PM SVANidhi Yojana beneficiary to have the app in question downloaded in their devices, if they can even download the same, to primarily track the status of services that they have taken from the officials at the helm of the initiative and take advantage of the monetary incentives that they are entitled to.
What is the significance of the PM Street Vendor’s Yojana?
The Street vendor community of India represents a very important constituent of the urban informal economy. They even play a fairly significant role in ensuring the availability of the goods and services to the street vendor brethren at competitive rates at the door-step of the people who dwell in the city. They go by the names such as our vendors, our hawkers, our thelawalas, our rehriwalas and even our theliphadwalas, among others in different areas/ contexts. The goods supplied by them are made up of the likes of vegetables, fruits, ready-to-eat food on the street, our morning teas, the pakodas, the baked goods, items of poultry, our fabrics, clothes, shoes, hand-crafted products, books/items for stationary etc. The services include the likes of barber shops, the cobblers, the cigarette shops and services related to laundry, amongst others. They were showing promising growth rates and prospects and signifying the flourishing of a thriving informal sector of an economy in a world where there was no pandemic to worry about.
But, then came the pandemic. And the consequent lockdowns have now taken a toll on the bread and butter of the members of our street vendor community. They usually tend to work with minimal capital requirements which they might have consumed during the lockdown periods. Hence, an initiative was needed to be set up in order to provide credit for working capital to the street vendors so that they can jumpstart the resumption of their businesses.
You can always learn more about the PM SVANidhi Yojana and the manner in which they operate on a street as well as a nation-wide level on Bajaj Markets,
Government based Business Loan Schemes
