Delhi’s vendors struggle to stay on the street as lasting solutions remain on paper

Shyam, a street vendor in Delhi, faces challenges despite government loans, highlighting issues faced by urban street vendors.

At the break of dawn, Shyam, 52, leaves his one-bedroom shanty in Laxmi Bai Nagar, Central Delhi, to buy vegetables from the wholesale Ghazipur market. By 7 a.m., he returns to the area to set up his vegetable cart for the day. He is one of the many street vendors who applied for the Prime Minister Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi), a government initiative providing collateral-free working capital loans for registered street vendors.

Four years after the interest-free scheme was launched, initially to get vendors going after they lost employment due to COVID-19 lockdowns, Shyam sees his fellow street vendors go through the ordeal of first getting the loan and then paying it off. He has now decided against availing of it, because he is unsure when he will be evicted from his spot on the street, threatening his income and livelihood.

The SVANidhi scheme allowed for accessible and affordable loans which would help vendors, many of whom had gone back to their villages from cities, come back to urban centres and restart their businesses. Under the scheme, a loan up to ₹10,000 is provided under the first tranche. If vendors are able to pay back this amount in 12 months, up to ₹20,000 is offered for the next 18 months under the second tranche, and up to ₹50,000 for the next 36 months under the third tranche.

“First, when the Street Vendors Act came [in 2014], I thought I would be allowed to live my life with dignity, but it was never implemented seriously,” he says. The Act was meant “to protect the rights of urban street vendors and to regulate street vending activities”. Now with the loan scheme, it’s the same cycle, complains Shyam. 

The Act covers any person engaged in vending goods or services to people in public spaces, especially on pavements or from a temporary built-up structure, or by moving from place to place. Fruit and vegetable sellers who pushed their carts around localities; roadside stalls selling tea, pakoras, and paan in shacks; those selling second-hand clothes or books; and traditionally held weekly markets were all covered, among many others. All street vendors were supposed to be provided licences to continue their work under the 2014 Act. However, the surveys to provide licences have been on halt for two years now. Delhi has over 6,00,000 street vendors approximately, as per union records.

A Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) official said on condition of anonymity, “There are several factors for this, including the unification of MCD and the lack of a standing committee in the civic body. The MCD has hired a company to conduct the surveys, but since it’s supposed to be done through biometrics, they are awaiting permission from UIDAI.”

Ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha election, leading national parties including the Bharatiya Janata Party, Indian National Congress, and Aam Aadmi Party raised the issues of street vendors. They have made street vendors poll promises of security, respect, and finding a lasting solution to their problems of harassment by the police and authorities.