PM scheme for vendors faces tech test in Dhanbad

Dhanbad: The lockdown-hit street vendors in Dhanbad are facing difficulties in availing the benefits of the Pradhan Mantri Street Vendors Atmanirbhar Nidhi Yojana — announced in the month of May — owing to the ‘lack of monitoring by Dhanbad Municipal Corporation (the implementing agency of the scheme) and the lack of awareness among the hawkers’.

A majority of the vendors from the district’s far-flung areas, such as Katras, Gomoh and Nirsa, have not signed up for the scheme — which promises them loans worth Rs 10,000 — ‘for many of them are not tech-savvy’. The district coordinator of the National Association for Street Vendors of India, (NASVI), Snehan Sinha, said, “If this situation persists, then only 600-800, out of the 6,000-odd vendors, will avail the benefits of the scheme as per our estimate.”

Sinha further said, “Although, as per the requirement of the Yojana, DMC carried out a survey last month to identify the new vendors in the district, they are yet to get their identity cards.”

He added that the vendors are finding it difficult to visit the banks to apply for the scheme. “In many areas, the community organisers (DMC volunteers), who are entrusted with the task of spreading awareness about the scheme, are not reaching out to the vendors. The volunteers are even not helping those vendors, who are not tech-savvy, in filling up the forms digitally,” Sinha claimed.

Echoing a similar view, Shyamal Mazumdar, the secretary of the Footpath Dukandar Roji Roti Uparjan Sangh, said, “Since many of the vendors do not have their mobile phones linked to their Aadhar Cards, they are facing difficulties in the online submission of forms.”

Upon contact, Santosh Kumar, the city mission manager of the National Urban Livelihood Mission in DMC, said, “We have deputed community organizers for helping those who can’t fill the forms on their own. They have also been given the responsibility of generating awareness about the loan scheme among all the vendors.”