To promote entrepreneurship, the government on Friday launched a ₹200-crore venture capital fund (VCF) for the Scheduled Caste (SC) community, which is 16.6 per cent of the country’s total population.

Announcing the scheme, Thaawar Chand Gehlot, Union Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment, said the fund will have an initial capital of ₹200 crore. IFCI will act as sponsor, settler and asset management company to operate the scheme, and would contribute ₹50 crore that would comprise ₹5 crore as sponsor and ₹45 crore as investor, an official statement said.

Gehlot said the aim of the fund was to provide support and concessional finance. Under the scheme, financial assistance up to ₹15 crore for a period up to six years would be provided to SC entrepreneurs. Incidentally, such a fund was also proposed by the previous UPA government, when the then Finance Minister P Chidambaram in his interim Budget speech in February 2014 announced a ₹200 crore VCF aimed at the SC community to be set up in association with IFCI.

On Friday, Gehlot also launched the Green Business Scheme for providing financial assistance keeping climate change concerns in mind. “Under this scheme, loan for units costing up to ₹1 lakh at concessional rate of interest will be provided to SCs for activities such as e-rickshaw, solar pump, etc,” the statement said.

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