Centre announces 9 steps to benefit migrants, farmers, vendors in second economic tranche

Announcing nine steps to aid migrant workers, street vendors, small farmers, self-employed people, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, on Thursday, rolled out free food grains, nationalised ration card, affordable rental housing for urban poor - all aimed at India's migrant population. She also extended several schemes for housing, street vendors and housing to provide relief till March 2021. This is the second set of measures made by FM Sitharaman, after PM Modi announced a Rs 20 lakh crore economic package - including the previous monetary package and the liquidity measures announced by RBI till date (amounting to 10.26 lakh crore) to kickstart Indian economy's growth.

9 key announcements in FM's briefing:

Migrants

• Free food-grain supply to all migrants for the next 2 months

Free food-grain supply to all migrants for the next 2 months. Non-Cardholder Migrants, shall be given 5 KG rice/wheat & 1 KG Chana per family for 2 months. This will help  8 crore migrants and cost will be fully borne by the Central Govt. 3500 crore will be spent on this.  State Govts will be responsible for implementation & identification of migrants
 

• One nation one ration card in three months

National portability of ration card with 'one Nation one ration card' will be implemented by August this year.  67 crore beneficiaries will gain in 23 states, using this ration card in any corner of the nation in the next three months. 83 per cent of the entire PDS population will be covered in three months. 100% coverage of national portability will be achieved by March 2021.

• Affordable rental housing for urban poor

Affordable rental accommodation for migrant labour and urban poor.  A rental housing scheme will be incentivised to build affordable housing and converting government housing into rental housing under PM Awas Yojana. We will be incentivising manufacturing units, industries and associations to build an affordable housing complex on their private land through PPP mode.

Shishu loans under MUDRA

• 2% interest reduction for Shishu loans under MUDRA

While loan moratorium has already been granted by the SBI, a 1500 crore interest subvention for MUDRA has been announced. The Centre will provide interest subvention of 2% for prompt payees for a period of employees. About 3 crore beneficiaries of MUDRA-Shishu loans will result in reducing 2% of interest rate in Shishu loans -  which comes to 1500 crores, borne by Centre.

Street vendors

• Rs 5000 Credit facility for street vendors

Rs. 5000 crore special credit facility for street vendors which will benefit 50 lakh street vendors. They will receive an initial working capital up to Rs 10000, eithin a month.

Housing

• Extension of CLSS till March 2021

70,000 crore boost to housing sector & middle income group through the extension of Credit Linked Subsidy Scheme (CLSS) by extending the scheme till March 2021. As of date, 3.3 lakh middle income families have benefited. Additionally, 2.5 lakhs middle income families will benefit until 2021, leading to the investment of over Rs 70,000 crore.

Tribals

• Employment via Rs 6000 crore CAMPA funds

Employment for tribals via Rs 6000 crores using Compensatory Afforestation Management & Planning Authority (CAMPA) Funds. This will for create Job opportunities in Urban, Semi urban & rural areas for Afforestation & plantation works.

Farmers

• Emergency working capital fund via NABARD

30,000 crore additonal emergency working capital funding for farmers via NABARD. While 90,000 crore has already been sanctioned by NABARD, additional Rs 30,000 crore will be pushed into this. This will benefit around 3 crore farmers to meet post havest (Rabi) & current Kharif requirement in May/June.

• 2 lakh concessional credit boost for farmers

Farmers holding Kisan Credit Cards will be provided concessional Credit boost amounting to Rs 2 lakh crore.  Fishermen & Animal husbandary farmers will also be included in this and 2.5 crore farmers will benefit from this.

Apart from these measures, the government also announced reforming labour laws in the near future. The current 44 labour laws are being reduced to just 4 labour codes. The bill is currently in the parliamentary standing committee and will soon be introduced in parliament.

Steps in pipeline:

•Universalisation of right to minimum wages & timely payment
•Appointment letters
•Annual health check
•Occupational Safety & Hazard Code
•Extension of ESIC coverage
•Social Security Fund
•Re-Skilling Fun