In an effort to bring the street food vendors into the fold of the online market, the Modi government has signed an MoU with food tech major Swiggy to bring street food vendors onboard of the e-commerce platform.
Under the Prime Minister Street Vendor’s AtmaNibhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) mission, the Modi government intends to help these street vendors to expand their business, who have been severely hit due to coronavirus pandemic.
In a press release, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs has stated that initially Swiggy and the ministry will run a pilot program by on-boarding 250 vendors across five cities – Ahmedabad, Chennai, Delhi, Indore, and Varanasi.
As a part of the initiative, these street food vendors will be assisted to get PAN and FSSAI registration, menu digitization and pricing, and training for packaging and maintaining hygiene practices.
Capital loan to be provided under the scheme
Under this mission, the government will be targeting at least 50 lakh street vendors, who will be provided with a working capital loan of up to Rs 10,000 to be payable in 12 months EMI.
The Urban Housing Ministry will also reward on time and early repayment of the loan with an interest subsidy at 7% per annum. The subsidy will be credited to the bank accounts of beneficiaries through Direct Benefit Transfer on a quarterly basis.
Upon the successful completion of the pilot project, MoHUA and Swiggy have a plan to expand this initiative across the country in phases.
According to MOHUA, they have received over 20 lakh loan applications under the PM SVANidhi Scheme. Out of these over 7.5 lakh loans have been sanctioned and over 2.4 lakh loans disbursed under the scheme.