The CMRY scheme has largely succeeded in achieving its objective of reducing unemployment in the State. About 6,500 persons have been sanctioned CMRY assistant of nearly Rs 175 crore, out of which Rs 148 crore is disbursed. The success of the scheme can be gauged by the wide variety of business ventures set up by the beneficiaries of the scheme across the State. They have been generally doing well and the same is reflected in the recovery percentage, which is consistently in excess of 90 per cent.
The CMRY scheme is a composite loan scheme wherein the beneficiaries are eligible for the share capital to local entrepreneurs and self employed scheme of Directorate of Industries, Trade & Commerce (DITC), Government of Goa. About 50 per cent of the project cost is financed to the beneficiaries, as interest free share capital, under the said scheme.
The scheme was started with a modest project cost limit of Rs 1.5 lakh. Over the years, need-based amendments and modifications have been carried out to the schemes and presently, the project cost limit has reached Rs 25 lakh for professionally and technically qualified persons and Rs 20 lakh for others. Another attractive feature which is added to the scheme is the 25 per cent project
subsidy on fixed assets. The women beneficiaries, enjoys 5 per cent additional loan amount and interest rebate of 2 per cent.
Chief Minister, Manohar Parrikar while inaugurating the Margao office about six month back said, “the business under CMRY is difficult to fail.” This is in contrary to the common belief that ‘business under loan is difficult to succeed.’
Speaking to the Herald the chairman of EDC, Sidharth Kuncalienker said, “with the support from State government, we at EDC are encouraging people in the State to take loans from us as we give them credit at very competitive rates. We are competing with all the banks and all commercial establishments which are in this business. Our interest rates are lowest as we apply the subsidies given by Goa government only after calculating our nominal rate of interest. In some cases, it is virtually like an interest-free loan. We are also decreasing the processing time with aid of technology. Every year we disburse around Rs 80 crore. This year we are expecting a better profit than the last years of Rs 60 crore odd and we will know that by the end of next month.”
Vice chairman of EDC, Santosh Kenkre is of the opinion that it has helped Goans because the rate of interest is hardly two per cent per annum and the loan seeker has to put in hardly 5-10% of the project cost.
“For ladies it is more attractive and they just have to put in 5% of their total project cost to launch a business. Also, our recovery percentage is hovering around 94%. We are easy to access, down to earth and we even help the loan seekers fill their forms. We in fact disburse loan on almost every business except businesses in liquor and tobacco. Lot of dentist, beauty parlours, grocery shop owners, taxi drivers, etc come to us for loans,” said Kenkre
Managing director of EDC, Kiran V Ballikar said, “We are getting good response. We are marketing the CMRY schemes in the interiors and rural areas of Goa. Our new office in South Goa is also working hard on it as we found that 70 per cent of the applicants were from north Goa alone. So for equitable distribution we are marketing the scheme in South Goa too. We have a target of three people every day so on an average, about thousand applications every year we get. People are showing interest and are turning out in large numbers whenever we hold camps in their area.”
Herald also spoke to beneficiaries of these loans (see quote. Dr Deepti Vinay Lotlikar who runs her own dental clinic at Porvorim said that, “CMRY loan interest rate for women is lower than anywhere else which is an added benefit. It is not possible for government to give jobs to everyone but with this CMRY loan we all are getting opportunity to set-up our own business and generate employment. The start-ups are getting a great benefit through this scheme.”
Rushali Samant who runs her beauty parlour and salon in Mapusa and is also a beneficiary of this CMRY scheme said, “I got my loan disbursed after nine months. But the rate of interest is very attractive and people from EDC helped me a lot to establish my business. In fact I found taking CMRY loan from EDC much simpler that what would have gone through in other commercial banks.”
Praful Krishna Paunikar runs a business of manufacturing of virgin coconut oil at Vasco-Da-Gama. He said, “When I went to bank as a start-up, the bank refused to entertain my plea for loan as I did not have a balance sheet of my business for the previous year. So, I went for an EDC training course at CIBA and after completion of that training I was given the CMRY loan. The interest rate was very less but there was a lot of paper work and the best part was that I had to pay back my loan EMIs only after six months of disbursement of loan. This scheme was really very helpful and business friendly.”
