Four months back, in June, the Union ministry of housing and urban affairs rolled out the Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) scheme to provide the COVID-19 lockdown-hit street-vendors “interest-free” loans up to Rs 10,000 to restart their work. The scheme targets to benefit over 50 lakh street vendors who had been vending on or before 24 March this year, in urban areas including those from surrounding peri-urban/ rural areas. So far, the ministry has received over two million loan applications under the scheme, of which it has sanctioned over 0.75 million loan applications and disbursed loans to over 0.24 million applicants. This means loan application of only 37.5 per cent street vendors has been sanctioned. And of those, loan has been disbursed to only 32 per cent.

This loan is repayable in easy monthly installments within a year and comes with no collateral rule. The PM SVANidhi scheme also provides an interest subsidy of seven per cent, which will be credited back to the beneficiary’s account who repay the loan on time. Furthermore, the vendors can also avail the facility of the increased credit limit on timely repayment.

Beneficiaries under this scheme include vegetable and fruit vendors, ready-to-eat street fruit vendors, hawkers, thele valas and rehri valas, cobblers, washermen, panwaris (betel-leaf shop owners), and handicraft vendors.

Uttar Pradesh leads the charge with 0.43 million loan applications followed by Telangana at 0.34 million applications. Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra have over 0.15 million applications, while Delhi has about 8,000 applicants. Vendors from newly created Union Territories of J&K (1,600 applications) and Ladakh (32 applications) have also applied for this scheme.

While the scheme has taken off, there is a large chunk of street vendors who are either unaware of the scheme, or are complaining about the time taken to sanction the loan. Gaon Connection spoke with a number of street vendors who claimed the application process and its sanctioning was tedious and time consuming. Many vendors who applied for a loan under the scheme are still waiting. The application status always shows up as ‘pending’ and never gets updated, they complained. 

“Because of the lockdown, I lost my only source of income. I did not have enough capital to restart my business, so I requested my relatives for some money,” Manoj Kumar, who owns a thela (hand cart) and sells pani batasha in Bahraich, Uttar Pradesh, told Gaon Connection. “Two months ago, I got to know about this new loan scheme for street vendors through one of my friends who got a loan through it. I applied online but I am still waiting to get the loan,” he added.

According to him, very few street vendors were aware of the scheme. “Many paan shop owners and thele valas, who are my friends, have requested me to help them apply for the loan,” he said.

“I applied for the loan online last month in September, but still haven’t got any update about my application. It still shows the application is pending in the application status online,” Mithun Kumar Singh, who owns a handicraft shop in Sarojni Market, New Delhi, told Gaon Connection.

“All the small shop owners have applied for the loan under the scheme and have got the loan number. But only one person from the market, who owns a small furniture shop, actually received the loan. Around a month ago, officials of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi visited his shop and a couple of days later his loan was sanctioned,” Salim Khan, who owns a small handicraft shop, in Central Market, Lajpat Nagar, New Delhi, complained.

With almost half a year of no business and no earnings, street vendors are eagerly awaiting some capital assistance from the government to restart their business. Every single day of delay is adding to their woes.

Recently, as a part of the PM SVANidhi scheme, the Union Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs has joined hands with Swiggy, India’s largest and highest-valued online food ordering and delivery platform, to register street food vendors online. At present, this initiative is launched on a pilot basis in five cities – Delhi, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Indore, and Varanasi. Residents of these five cities will soon get food from street vendors at their doorstep. This scheme also promotes digital transactions through cashback incentives up to an amount of Rs 100 per month.

“This collaboration will help the street food vendors to compete with big restaurants. Street food vendors can earn more if they focus on improving the quality of their food,” Ramesh Sharma, a Swiggy delivery person from New Delhi told Gaon Connection.