Ahead of the scheduled civic polls, Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has decided to provide micro loans of ₹10,000 to 1.80 lakh street vendors in the city under the PM SVANidhi Scheme. “The target for the city under the scheme was 55,000, but we sought a hike in the target and got it set at 1.8 lakh,” said Ram Prasat Manohar, Special Commissioner (Welfare), BBMP. Bank kiosks will be opened at markets to help street vendors avail loans, he said.
There is a problem though. The city’s civic body has till date only identified 25,000-odd street vendors through the first ever survey held in 2017 and issued ID cards only to 14,000 of them till date, while street vendor unions estimate the number of vendors in the city to be in the range of 1.5 - 2 lakh. Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014 stipulates the formation of town vending committees and a survey of street vendors every five years, and as per that schedule, a survey is pending this year.
“Though the two processes are unrelated, it is a fine opportunity for the civic body to carry out an extensive survey of street vendors in the city and provide them with ID cards, and identify vending zones which will free them of harassment by the police,” said Lekha Adavi, of Bengaluru Jilla Beedi Vyapari Sanghatanegala Okkuta.
BBMP Chief Commissioner Tushar Giri Nath agrees. “I have directed officials to carry out an extensive survey of street vendors while identifying beneficiaries of the PM SVANidhi scheme,” he said.
Bogus registrations and misuse of loans
S. Babu, President of the Okkuta, said in the absence of an extensive survey, PM SVANidhi loans were being sanctioned based on Letters of Recommendation (LoR) from town vending committees to identify street vendors. Mr. Babu said this was not only ad-hoc but was leading to misuse of loans and corruption.
“There have been instances last year where many from the same family, who are not even street vendors, got LoRs from town vending committees as street vendors, secured multiple loans and in turn gave them to street vendors for high rates of interest,” he said.
Mr. Babu said an extensive survey of all street vendors was an immediate need. “When I raised the issue of the survey in the town vending committee of the west zone on Wednesday, officials said LoRs issued for PM SVANidhi loans will be treated as provisional ID cards and will be used to identify street vendors at a later date. But this is a faulty procedure and will only lead to bogus registrations to avail benefits, while the real street vendors will be left in the lurch. We want town vending committees to issue LoRs at the site of vending in the presence of other street vendors,” he said.
