How to Start your Buisness and get Initial funding with Stand Up India Scheme?

The Stand-up India Scheme was introduced to encourage entrepreneurship at the local level on April 5, 2016. It puts an emphasis on economic empowerment and job development, particularly  for Women, Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs), to hone their entrepreneurial potential. The programme has now been extended until 2025, providing more opportunities for budding entrepreneurs to convert their ideas into successful businesses.

What benefits can you avail under Stand-up India?

1.      Avail loans from Rs. 10 lakh to Rs. 1 crore, for your business.

2.      Loans to set up greenfield projects. "Green field" refers to the beneficiary's first venture into the manufacturing, services, or trading sectors, as well as operations related to agriculture.

3.      The amount of margin money that the borrower must provide has been lowered from "up to 25%" to "up to 15%" of the project cost. However, the borrower will continue to make his or her own contribution of at least 10% of the project cost.

4.      The stress of repayment is lowered by expanding the span of repayment to as long as 7 years.

5.      One can avail moratorium on loan for a maximum of 18 months. 

6.      The interest rate would be the lowest applicable rate set by the bank for that rating category, not to exceed the sum of the base rate (MCLR) plus 3 % and the tenor premium.

Other support provided by the Government:

1.      Handholding support is provided to the new businesses, an interactive Stand Up India portal, that has more than 8000 handholding agencies connecting business owners to experts from District Industries Center, Centers for Entrepreneurship Development, Mentorship support and Training Center.

2. The Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) built the web platform https://www.standupmitra.in/ for the Stand-Up India Scheme, which connects potential borrowers to banks for loans.

3. Under this scheme, SIDBI is giving advice to aspiring business owners on how to launch ventures, from training to preparing loan applications in accordance with bank criteria.

4. The Credit Guarantee Fund for Stand-Up India was established by the Indian government to expand collateral-free coverage (CGFSI).

5. Additionally, it allows for convergence with state and federal government programmes.

How to avail the benefits of Stand Up India?

Applications under this Scheme can be availed through all branches of Scheduled Commercial Banks. There are three ways to do so –

1. Offline mode, by directly going to the branch.

2. Online application made through the Stand Up India Portal, which you can access via www.standupmitra.in

3. Connecting through the Lead-District Manager (LDR), that connects entrepreneurs with various banks and connects centres like SIDBI or NABARD.

Who are eligible under Stand-up India?

1. Entrepreneurs that are SC/ST or women and are at least 18 years old.

2. Only green field projects are eligible for loans under this programme.

3. Eligible non-individual firms must be controlled by either SC/ST or female entrepreneurs who own 51% of the equity.

4. Loans for "activities allied to agriculture" enterprises, such as poultry, livestock rearing, pisciculture, apiculture, aggregation agro industries like for grading, sorting, agriclinic and agribusiness centres, food & agro-processing, and services supporting these shall be eligible now for coverage under the Scheme (with the exception of crop loans, land improvement such as canals, irrigation, wells).

5. There should be no default by borrowers to any bank or financial institution.