New Delhi, Dec 15 (IANS): Rakesh Mishra, a local resident of Neemuch in Madhya Pradesh witnessed one of the ‘toughest hours’ of his life during Covid pandemic as his tea business collapsed and all his savings exhausted, thus throwing him and family into severe financial stress.

Today, he has seen a reversal in fortunes and is again looking up at the brighter side of life because of the refurbished tea business. He credits this success to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's people-friendly policies and commitment to serve the poor.

Rakesh Mishra and his family are living a moderately good life and making their own livelihood, with support from the Prime Minister Street Vendor’s Atma Nirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) scheme.

The PM SVANidhi scheme, launched with the mission of empowering street vendors and reviving livelihoods has gone a long way in reviving umpteen ‘broken lives’ and also restoring the businesses that collapsed and got swept away by the deadly pandemic.

Rakesh Mishra, a Neemuch resident, says that had his family not received help under the PM SVANidhi scheme, they could have just perished.

Today, he earns his living by running a tea shop. After the lockdown during the Corona period, he suffered intense hardships and got bogged down by family responsibilities. It was then that PM SVANidhi came to his aid.

He applied for a loan of Rs 10,000 under the PM SVANidhi and got Rs 10,000 sanctioned. He started operating his tea shop again and after depositing Rs 10,000 on time in the bank, he again got a loan of Rs 20,000.

He further got a loan of Rs 50,000 and then Rs 1 lakh by depositing it on time. Today, Rakesh Mishra has not only nurtured his family with the help of the money received through this Pradhan Mantri Swanidhi Yojana but has also provided employment for two other youths in his own shop.

The timely assistance that he got helped him to support his children financially. Today, his son is an engineer and works at a factory in Pune, while his daughter works at One Stop Center in Neemuch after completing her education.

Notably, the PM SVANidhi Scheme was launched by PM Modi on June 1, 2020, with the aim to facilitate collateral free working capital loan to street vendors to restart their businesses, which were adversely impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Under the scheme, the street vendors were entitled to get collateral free working capital loan up to Rs 10,000, of 1 year tenure, with enhanced loan of Rs 20,000 and Rs 50,000 in the second and third tranches respectively, on repayments of earlier loans.