COVID-19 epidemic adversely affected the global economy and now India is also facing this epidemic. India remained under nationwide lockout for more than 50 days, which adversely affected India and the Indian economy.
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To overcome these adverse times, the Government of India has formulated several strategies and action plans. These strategies include all these actions: increasing deadlines, granting working capital loans, startup boot programs and other facilities that will be supported by SBI, SIDBI, GEM and etc.
SBI Funding Scheme For COVID-19
State Bank of India, one of the largest lenders in India, has launched a funding scheme to help small and medium businesses, with the help of which all these businesses will be able to continue their operations smoothly. SBI has been providing additional credit through its COVID-19 Emergency Credit Line (CECL), to its existing MSME borrowers who are facing stress due to COVID-19.
Under the CECL scheme Loans provided up to 10% of the existing fund-based working capital limits with a maximum cap of Rs 200 Cr. Interest will be charged under this scheme at a fixed interest rate of 7.25%.
Some of the important features of the SBI COVID-19 Emergency Credit Line (CECL) loan scheme:
- CECL loan will be provided to you as a demand loan for 12 months. Whose function is to help you to meet your temporary cash flow requirements.
- The scheme is available to businesses that do not have an overdue for more than 30 days on 16 March.
- Borrowers who are willing to avail special loans for small and medium class businesses are also eligible for this scheme. Due to late filing for TDS return is extended. The Govt has also extended the deadline for the employers to issue Form 16 for FY 2019-20 is 15th August 2020.
Deadline Extension of Tax Filing
The deadline for filing the Income Tax Return (ITR) of the business for the AY 2019-20 was 31 March 2020 which has been extended till 31 July 2020.
The last date to furnish the TDS returns was 30 March 2020, but now the deadline for filing TDS returns has been extended till 31 July 2020.
Insolvency Limit Increased for MSMEs
To give relief to the MSME sector amid the transition to COVID-19, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has announced to increase the old limit for bankruptcy to Rs 1 lakh to Rs 1 crore. This has been done to prevent bankruptcy proceedings in India.
She also said in her briefing that we will monitor the current situation and may suspend section 7, 9 and 10 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code Provisions in the upcoming days.
MSME Ideas Portal
The Government of India has launched an MSME idea portal to promote entrepreneurship which provides access to all schemes offered by the Union, State and UT Governments. The portal aims to support MSMEs which are primarily located in rural and semi-urban areas. It also has a provision for uploading ideas, innovations and research in the portal, which will be reviewed and then published in the public domain by the department.
Atal Bimit Vyakti Kalyan Yojana
The Atal Bima Yojana Kalyan Yojana is a welfare measure, which was launched in 2018, by the Employees State Insurance (ESI) Corporation, can be very helpful in the current COVID-19 epidemic.
Due to the nationwide lockout, many businesses are temporarily closed because there is no work or some businesses struggling to pay their worker’s daily wages due to lack of working capital. If your business is also struggling with the same situation, then this scheme can be beneficial for your workers and you can also suggest this to them.
In this scheme, those who have lost their employment will be compensated in cash for three months from the time of unemployment. But one needs to subscribe to Employees State Insurance (ESI) scheme to avail this scheme.
GeM (Government e-Marketplace)
GeM was launched on 09 August 2016, here you can easily sell your goods to the government through the e-marketplace.
Due to the COVID-19 epidemic, the government is in need of a huge amount of medical, health and safety-related products and equipment for its employees and healthy workers. All these requirements are presented in the GeM government portal. To meet this huge demand you need to register your products on the platform. This marketplace can help in running your business during COVID-19.
SIDBI Scheme for Startups
The COVID-19 epidemic has created many operational and financial challenges for startups and to solve this problem. The Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) has made some major efforts to support affected startups. They have launched a scheme called COVID-19 Startup Support Scheme (CSAS) which aims to provide financial assistance and stability to start-ups.
This scheme will support startups that have performed favorably in times of pandemics and economic crisis, such as Covid-19.
CSAS supports new startups with the objective of providing quick working capital loans of up to Rs 2 crore within 45 to 90 days. Which will be processed by a 5-member recommended committee.
These are some of the measures taken by the government to help you meet compliance and can help your business run effectively in the event of current crisis and pandemic.
