Preliminary survey finds 886 children either begging and hawking

BBMP to undertake detailed surveys to identify minors begging and street vendors

The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has taken up two surveys – one to identify street vendors who will be beneficiaries of the Pradhan Mantri SvaNidhi (PM Street Vendors’ Atmanirbhar Scheme), and another for identification of children begging and hawking.

Following directions of the Karnataka High Court, the civic body is undertaking a survey to identify children found begging and hawking miscellaneous items on roads and junctions. A press release on Wednesday said that a preliminary survey had identified 886 such children in the city. The data collection team will be trained to ask the right questions to gather appropriate information from the children, the release added.

BBMP Commissioner N. Manjunath Prasad chaired a meeting with senior officials from all zones, police personnel and Karnataka State Legal Services Authority to review measures taken up for these two surveys.

Under the PM SvaNidhi scheme, street vendors can avail micro loans amounting to ₹10,000. There is a target of extending the scheme to 85,400 street vendors, as per the 2011 census. Thus far, 64,147 applications have been distributed, of which details of 39,512 filled-in applications had been uploaded on the portal.

The Commissioner directed revenue officials to helm the survey in all eight zones, issue forms to street vendors and upload the same on the PM SvaNidhi portal.