Informal Micro Enterprises (IMEs) are those enterprises that are not covered in the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime.

The apex bank said the certificate will benefit all those enterprises which are unable to get registered on the Udyam Registration Portal (URP) due to a lack of mandatory required documents, such as Permanent Account Number (PAN) or Goods and Services Tax Identification Number (GSTIN) and due to which they are unable to avail the benefits of government schemes or programmes.

The RBI said the turnover of enterprises exempted from filing returns under the provisions of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 shall be the sole criterion to be defined as IMEs for the purpose of UAP.

The move is result of Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) launching the Udyam Assist Platform (UAP) to facilitate formalisation of Informal Micro Enterprises (IMEs) through online generation of Udyam Assist Certificate.

The registration on the platform is done with the assistance of designated agencies which are RBI regulated entities (including scheduled commercial banks, non-banking financial companies, etc.). 

The RBI circular said, the government through a gazette notification on March 20, 2023 had specified that the certificate issued on the UAP to IMEs shall be treated at par with Udyam Registration Certificate for the purpose of availing Priority Sector Lending (PSL) benefits.

The RBI circular further said, the government has created an interface between the UAP and Udyam Registration Portal (URP) to enable the transition and migration of the IMEs from UAP to URP, once IMEs obtain the mandatorily required documents.

In view of the aforementioned notification and clarification, IMEs with an Udyam Assist Certificate shall be treated as Micro Enterprises under MSME for the purposes of PSL classification, the RBI circular added.