More than 15 lakh loan applications have been received so far under the PM Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) Scheme, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs said in an official press release.

The government has sanctioned 5.5 lakh applications and about 2 lakh applicants’ loans have been disbursed, said the Ministry. The Ministry is implementing PM SVANidhi Scheme which was launched on June 1. The schemes are aimed at facilitating the collateral-free working capital loan to 50 lakh street vendors to restart their businesses post-Covid.

"In order to expedite the loan sanctioning process and provide ease of operation to the lenders, it has been decided to push the applications directly to the bank branches, which have been indicated by the vendor as ‘Preferred Lender’ or where the Vendor holds a savings bank account in case ‘Preferred Lender’ is not indicated. This process is expected to give boost to the number of loans sanctioned and cut down the time for loan disbursal drastically," the release said.

"A software has been developed to facilitate the process, which was made operational on September 11, 2020. Approximately three lakh applications would be pushed to the banks using this software. Henceforth, the applications would be pushed to the preferred lenders on a daily basis and for those where no preferred lender is indicated, on a weekly basis," the release added..