MSME loans up to 1 Crore within 59 minutes: FM

The government on Tuesday (September 25, 2018) announced 3 new major initiatives viz. Quick loan for MSME, Financial inclusion index, and Geographical mapping of banking services.

The Finance Minister on Tuesday launched a new portal “Quick loan for MSME” which sets, for a new benchmark in loan processing and reduces the turnaround time from 20-25 days to 59 minutes.  The borrower will get in principle approval within 59 minutes after submitting the details online and the loan will be disbursed in 7-8 working days. In the presentation to the state owned bankers, Financial Services Secretary Mr.Rajiv Kumar informed that an MSME borrower needs to submit GST and income tax details along with the bank statement to be eligible for fast track loan sanction.  Once the prospective borrower fills in the application form online and submits the required details, a single gateway will integrate the platforms that will help perform back–end checks with the ministry of corporate affairs and credit information bureau (CIBIL ) for fraud and product checks before the loan is sanctioned. It is informed that the portal has been already set up by SBI, PNB, Bank of Baroda, Indian Bank and Vijaya Bank. Other banks are expected to join in coming days.

FM also announced two other new initiatives like ranking states on financial inclusion and mobile app to help consumers to locate nearest branch and ATM. The Financial Inclusion index will be a measure of access and usage of a basket of formal financial products and services that includes savings, remittances, credit, insurance and pension products. The index will have 3 measurement dimensions, viz. access to financial services, usage of financial services and quality. The  banking services infrastructure locator app” Jan Dhan Darshak” targets to bring banking within reach of every citizens through over 5 lakh “banking touch points” comprising of bank branches, banking correspondents, ATMs, Common service centres and post offices. The GIS (Geographic Information System) mapping of banking services will be a convinient method for  any person to find the nearest banking touch point,”  which will help to make banking services available within 5 kilometers of every house hold.