- Six years after its launch, PM SVANidhi has helped over 75 lakh street vendors access formal credit through more than 1.12 crore loans worth ₹17,800 crore, significantly improving livelihoods and financial inclusion.
- The scheme has accelerated digital adoption, enabling over 841 crore digital transactions and encouraging UPI usage through cashback incentives and interest subsidies.
- While its impact has been substantial, expanding vendor identification, improving survey implementation, and creating pathways to larger formal credit remain key challenges for the future.
A SCENE REPEATED 75 LAKH TIMES
Picture a vegetable vendor in Lucknow. Before June 2020, if her cart was washed out in the monsoon, there was no bank that would lend her the few thousand rupees she needed to restock. The moneylender would, at 60% interest. The PM Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) scheme, launched in the middle of a pandemic, was designed to break that cycle. 6 years later, it has done exactly that and considerably more.
On June 1, 2026, the scheme marked its 6th anniversary. The numbers are striking. Over 75 lakh street vendors have availed more than 1.12 crore loans worth over Rs 17,800 crore. Nearly 95% of those borrowers entered formal institutional credit for the first time in their lives.
| 1.12 Cr+ Total Loans Disbursed | ₹17,800 Cr Loan Value | 841 Cr+ Digital Transactions | ~20% Avg. Income Growth/Year |
THE ARCHITECTURE OF TRUST
The scheme works on a staggered lending model. Timely repayment unlocks a second tranche and then a third — rising in value and building a formal credit history in the process. As of January 2026, 72.71 lakh vendors had availed loans under this structure.
An impact assessment study by the Indian School of Business in 2025 found that average annualised business income among SVANidhi borrowers grew by approximately 20% between 2023 and 2025. For a demographic that has historically been invisible to formal economic measurement, that is a material change in livelihood.
| “Nearly 95% of SVANidhi beneficiaries entered formal institutional credit for the first time. For millions, this was not just a loan — it was recognition.” |
THE DIGITAL LEAP
Perhaps the least-expected outcome of SVANidhi is its digital footprint. Nearly Rs 800 crore has reached street vendors through cashback incentives and interest subsidies directly linked to UPI adoption. Over 841 crore digital transactions worth nearly Rs 9 lakh crore have been processed through the scheme’s network. A street vendor in Patna processing payments via QR code is no longer a curiosity. She is a data point in the IMF’s acknowledgment of India’s UPI system as the world’s largest real-time payments network by volume.
The restructured scheme, approved by the Union Cabinet in August 2025, extended lending until March 2030 with an enhanced outlay of Rs 7,332 crore and targets 1.15 crore total beneficiaries including 50 lakh new entrants. A UPI-linked RuPay Credit Card has been introduced for vendors who repay the second tranche.
WHAT ACCOUNTABILITY DEMANDS
The scheme has succeeded at scale. But success at scale is not the same as justice at scale. Several states have been slow in conducting vendor surveys under the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014, leaving eligible vendors without Certificates of Vending and therefore outside the scheme’s reach. Urban Local Bodies must be held to survey deadlines with measurable state-level accountability dashboards.
The next 6 years of SVANidhi should carry a different ambition: not just reaching vendors but graduating them. Credit histories built under SVANidhi must be usable across the financial system. The government must work with SIDBI and the RBI to ensure that an SVANidhi credit record is formally recognised as collateral-equivalent for the next level of credit. The goal is not a perpetual micro-loan scheme. It is a bridge to the economy’s formal centre. Build the bridge and let the vendors walk.
Clear Cut Livelihood, Research Desk
New Delhi, UPDATED: June 11, 2026 09:00 IST
Written By: Tanmay URS
