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NHFDC

Eligibility Criteria

Criteria of Disability

The beneficiary should be a disabled person or a cooperative society of disabled persons or a legally constituted association of disabled persons or a firm promoted by disabled persons unless otherwise mentioned in the scheme for financing.

In order to be eligible for loans on concessional interest rates from the Corporation, minimum degree of disability shall not be less than 40 percent.

A person with disability means a person:

Who is blind or
Who is a person with low vision, or
Who is speech and hearing handicapped, or
Who has a locomotor disability on account of orthopedic or neurological impairment (including cerebral palsy) or
Who is mentally retarded, or
Who is multiple handicapped, and includes any persons who is unable to ensure by himself/herself, wholly or partly, the necessities or a normal individual or social life including work as a result of deficiency, whether congenital or not, in his/her physical or mental capabilities.

Explanation for the purpose of the disabilities mentioned above:

a person shall be deemed to be blind if he suffers from either of the following conditions, namely:
1. total absence of sight, or
2. visual acuity not exceeding 6/60 or 20/200 (snellen in the better eye with correcting lenses ) or
3. limitation of field of vision subtending an angle of 20 degree or worse.
a person with low vision is one who has impairment of visual functioning even after treatment and/ or standard refractive correction, but who uses, or is potentially able to use vision for the planning or execution of a task with appropriate assistive device.
a person shall be deemed to be deaf if he/she has lost sixty decibels or more in the better ear in the conversational range or frequencies.
a person shall be deemed to have locomotor disability if he is having disability of the bones, joints or muscles leading to substantial restriction of the movement of the limbs or if has any form of cerebral palsy.
mental retardation refers to sub-average general intellectual functioning, which originates during the development period and is associated with impairment in a adaptive behaviour.
mentally ill person shall have the same meaning as assigned to the word in para (i), Section 2, Chapter I of Mental Health Act. 1987.
Leprosy-cured persons mean and included leprosy cured persons –
1. with loss of sensation in hands or feet as well as of sensation and paresis in the eye and eye lid but with no manifest deformity;
2. with manifest deformity and paresis but having sufficient mobility in their hands and feet to enable them to engage in normal economic activity;
3. suffering from extreme physical deformity as well as advanced age which prevents them from re-entering into any economic activity;
multiple handicapped means and includes a person with more than one disability.

Economic/Income Criteria

Unemployed disabled persons whose family income is below Rs.22,000/- p.a. for rural areas and Rs.24,000/- p.a for urban areas (two times of poverty line) are eligible for availing loan facility. (Family means parents or spouse of dependent disabled)

In case of self dependent disabled, the income of the individual will only be taken into account.

The economic criteria will also be applicable to each member of a cooperative society of disabled persons, association of disabled persons and firm promoted by disabled persons seeking financial assistance from NHFDC.

Minimum age limit for availing loan is 18 years and maximum age is 55 years. However, the maximum age could be relaxed in the case of professionally, qualified entrepreneurs.

The sanctioned loan amount and repayment period will depend on the age of applicant.

Other Requirements

The applicant:

should be an Indian citizen;
should be domicile of the state where the project is proposed to be put up;
should have relevant educational/technical/vocational qualification/experience/background;
should not have any large outstanding debt from other organisation and should not be financial defaulter;
should be from agriculture background and project location should be in agriculture area if seeking loan under the scheme ‘ Assistance for Agricultural Activities’.

Types of Funding:

NHFDC can consider following types-of loans;

Term Loan

The Corporation can consider grant of Term Loan to a disabled entrepreneur or group of disabled entrepreneurs through the channelising agency.

Under Term Loan Scheme, loans are given upto 100% of project cost as follows:

For the project with high working capital component, quantum of loan will depend upon the total cost of the project as follow:

Where the total cost of the scheme does not exceed Rs.50,000 the scheme will be treated as a composite loan and no distinction will be made between fixed asset and working capital. In such cases loans can be granted upto 100% of the total cost.
Where the unit cost of the project is more than Rs.50,000 but does not exceed Rs.1,00,000 the ratio of fixed assets to working capital will not exceed 1:3.
Where the unit cost of the scheme exceed Rs.1.00 lakh, only 50% of the working capital requirement will be added in the project cost as working capital margin to arrive at the unit cost of the project, remaining amount of the working capital will have to be financed by the banks as cash credit limit.

In order to cover maximum number of beneficiaries, 75% of the amount of term loans sanctioned in any financial year to a Channelising Agency shall be for those projects where NHFDC loan component is below Rs.1,00,000 per unit.