Providing Tin Stalls to Gatai Kamgar (LIDCOM Gattai Stall Scheme)

What is the Providing Tin Stalls to Gatai Kamgar scheme?

Providing Tin Stalls to Gatai Kamgar is a welfare scheme of the Sant Rohidas Leather Industries and Charmakar Development Corporation Ltd (LIDCOM), a Maharashtra government corporation set up on 1 May 1974 and working under the Social Justice and Special Assistance Department. Locally the scheme is known as the Gatai stall yojana, and the beneficiaries are gatai kamgar: roadside cobblers who repair and stitch footwear sitting on pavements and street corners with no shelter of any kind.

According to LIDCOM, the scheme provides a tin stall of size 4 feet x 5 feet x 6.5 feet costing Rs 16,367 per stall on a 100 percent subsidy, together with Rs 500 as incidental or erection charges. The beneficiary contributes nothing. The purpose is practical rather than symbolic: a cobbler working in the open loses working days to heat, rain and wind, cannot store tools and leather safely overnight, and has no fixed address that customers can return to. A locked tin stall solves all three problems at once.

Main features

• 100 percent subsidy, there is no loan, no margin money and no repayment.
• The benefit is delivered as a physical asset, not as money in the bank.
• Reserved for the Scheduled Caste Charmakar community, which includes Chambhar, Dhor, Holar and Mochi.
• Administered district by district through LIDCOM's district offices.
• Applications are taken offline on a printed form.

Who is eligible for the Gatai Kamgar tin stall?

You can be considered if:

• You belong to the Charmakar community, a Scheduled Caste, with a caste certificate from the competent authority.
• You are a permanent resident of Maharashtra.
• You are between 18 and 50 years of age, the band LIDCOM publishes for its schemes.
• You hold a valid income certificate issued by an authorised government officer, normally the Tahsildar.
• You have prior working knowledge of the cobbler trade, which LIDCOM lists as a condition across its schemes. This is a scheme for people already in the occupation, not a start-up grant.

You cannot apply if:

• You are not from the Charmakar community. LIDCOM's mandate is the comprehensive protection of that community and the scheme is not open to other castes; applicants from other Scheduled Castes are not eligible here and should look at the Social Justice Department's general schemes instead.
• You live outside Maharashtra.
• You are under 18 or above 50 years of age.
• You cannot produce a caste certificate or an income certificate from a government-authorised officer. Affidavits and private certificates are not eligible substitutes.
• You are asking for a stall as a rental or trading asset rather than to work in it yourself.

LIDCOM's published criteria for the stall scheme do not fix a rupee income ceiling on the scheme page itself, though an income certificate is compulsory and the corporation's schemes are aimed at families around the poverty line. Confirm the ceiling in force with your district office rather than relying on figures quoted on unofficial websites.

What documents are required for the Gattai stall scheme?

How to apply for the Gatai Kamgar tin stall

1. Locate your LIDCOM district office, the corporation runs district offices across Maharashtra, usually within or near the Social Welfare office complex at the district headquarters.
2. Visit during office hours and ask for the Gattai stall application form. The form is given free of cost; nobody is authorised to charge for it.
3. Obtain the supporting papers before filling the form: the Charmakar caste certificate, an income certificate from the Tahsildar, residence proof, age proof and Aadhaar.
4. Fill the form completely, including where you currently work as a cobbler and where the stall would be placed, and attach self-attested copies of every document.
5. Submit the form at the same district office and take a dated acknowledgement or inward number.
6. Follow up with the district manager after a few weeks. Sanctions are made against the district's annual allocation of stalls, and pending proposals are carried into the next allocation.
7. On sanction, take delivery of the stall and collect the Rs 500 erection charge as per the district office's procedure.

For queries, LIDCOM's head office numbers are (022) 45240417, (022) 22044186 and (022) 22047157.

How much is the benefit worth?

The scheme's value to a beneficiary is Rs 16,867 in total. A stall costing Rs 16,367 plus Rs 500 in incidental or erection charges, with a 100 percent subsidy, meaning the state bears the whole cost. Because the benefit is an asset rather than cash, there is no instalment schedule, no bank credit and no repayment.

That structure is what distinguishes this scheme from the rest of LIDCOM's portfolio. The corporation's 50 percent subsidy scheme advances a bank loan of up to Rs 50,000 with a subsidy capped at Rs 10,000, and the Margin Money scheme covers projects from Rs 50,001 to Rs 5,00,000, with seed capital at 4 percent interest and a subsidy of up to Rs 10,000 from the corporation. Both of those create a repayment obligation. The Gattai stall does not.

How to check the status of your application

1. Visit or telephone the LIDCOM district office where the form was submitted and quote the inward number on your acknowledgement.
2. Ask specifically whether your proposal has been included in the current year's allocation or carried forward, since that is the real bottleneck rather than document verification.
3. For escalation, contact LIDCOM's head office on (022) 22044186 or (022) 22047157.
4. The Social Justice and Special Assistance Department's page on LIDCOM lists the corporation's organisational contacts if the district office is unresponsive.

LIDCOM does not publish an online status tracker for the Gattai stall scheme, so the district office record is the only authoritative source.

Common reasons applications do not go through

• Caste certificate does not name the Charmakar community or is a general Scheduled Caste certificate that the district office cannot map to the scheme's target group.
• Income certificate missing or expired. These are typically treated as valid for one year.
• Applicant outside the 18 to 50 age band on the date of application.
• No workable location for the stall — a cobbler who cannot show a spot where the municipal body or gram panchayat will allow the stall to stand is hard to sanction, because the corporation would be handing over an asset that cannot be installed.
• District allocation exhausted: not a rejection at all, but the commonest reason for a long wait. LIDCOM has publicly acknowledged a backlog of pending proposals across its schemes and has run scheme fairs to clear them.
• Duplicate benefit. A household that has already received a stall is not sanctioned a second one.

Important dates and how allocation works

The scheme has no application window and no last date; district offices accept forms through the year. What varies is the number of stalls a district can distribute in a financial year, which depends on the budget provision made for LIDCOM. Applications submitted after a district's quota is used up are ordinarily held for the next year rather than rejected, so it is worth asking for written confirmation that your file has been carried forward.

Where to raise a grievance

• LIDCOM district office; first point of contact for all scheme matters.
• LIDCOM head office, Mumbai; (022) 45240417, (022) 22044186, (022) 22047157.
• Assistant Commissioner, Social Welfare at the district headquarters, since LIDCOM works under the Social Justice and Special Assistance Department.
• Aaple Sarkar grievance portal at grievances.maharashtra.gov.in for a written and trackable complaint.

Both the application form and the stall are free. Any demand for money to "arrange" a stall is unauthorised and should be reported to the district office in writing.