Govt launches drive to on-board 8.68 lakh street vendors for digital payments

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The IT ministry along with the housing and urban affairs is launching a special drive in 223 cities to on-board more than 8 lakh street vendors to start accepting and making digital payments. The drive has been launched under PM SVANidhi scheme.

"The special drive aims to accelerate on-boarding of street vendors on the UPI QR code and handhold them to start accepting and making digital payment transactions. Five major aggregators including Paytm, Phone Pe, Bharat Pe, Mswipe and Aceware have agreed to participate in 45-day special drive for digitally onboarding the street vendors with BHIM-UPI QR code on pro-bono basis," Ministry of Electronics and IT said in a statement. The move is expected to enable inclusion of street vendors in the formal credit ecosystem, and help in driving financial inclusion of the unorganized sector.

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"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," the statement said.

The digital payment aggregators will also hand hold the street vendors by performing penny drop transactions and any further support that is required to accept and pay digitally.

According to the Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry, 45.5 lakh applications have so far been received under the PM Street Vendor's AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) and of these, loans of Rs 27.2 lakh have been sanctioned and 24.6 lakh have been disbursed.

"The amount disbursed so far is Rs 2,444 crore. More than 70,448 street vendors have repaid their first loan tranche. Out of 22.41 lakh digitally on-boarded street vendors, 7.24 lakh street vendors are digitally active and have recorded 5.92 crore number of digital transactions," the ministry said in a statement. "The amount disbursed so far is Rs 2,444 crore.

PM SVANidhi had been launched on June 1, 2020 as a central sector scheme.