Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah on Friday inaugurated a National Mega Conclave on the launch of Common Services Centre (CSC) services by Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS) here.

On this occasion, Communications, Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY) and Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnav; Minister of State for Cooperation B L Verma; Cooperation Secretary Gyanesh Kumar; MeitY Secretary Alkesh Kumar Sharma and Managing Director of CSC-SPV Sanjay Rakesh were present.

Shah said the integration of PACS and CSC will eliminate corruption from governance through CSC under the Digital India Mission and take several facilities to the doorsteps of the poor people and strengthen the rural economy.

He said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had guided the Ministry of Cooperation with a great vision. If the cooperative movement has to be strengthened, then its smallest unit PACS has to be strengthened, he said. Until the PACS are strong, the cooperative movement cannot be strengthened.

Therefore, the government has decided to computerize the PACS to make them transparent, to ensure their accountability and also to modernize them so that the digitized schemes of the government can be integrated with the PACS.

Shah said that within 20 days of the formation of the Ministry of Cooperation, the Prime Minister had provided Rs 2,500 crore for computerization of PACS, as a result of which 65,000 PACS are being computerized.

The Cooperation Minister said that there can be no bigger means than CSC to implement the formula of “Minimum Government, Maximum Governance with last mile delivery but without corruption.”

He said that more than 300 small beneficiary schemes of the Government of India and State Governments have been integrated with CSC. He said there can be no better medium than PACS to deliver CSC services to the poorest of the poor in the villages, landless agricultural laborers and Dalit and Tribal communities.

Today PACS and CSC are getting united; this will not only increase the facilities of the poor but will also strengthen the rural economy. Till now, 17,176 PACS have been registered in CSC.

He congratulated the Secretary, Ministry of Cooperation and the entire team of the Ministry for this significant achievement. He said that out of 17,176 PACS, about 6,670 have started functioning and the remaining PACS would also start functioning in next 15 days.

This will provide employment to about 14,000 rural youth and these youth will also work to strengthen the rural economy and facilities in the villages. He said that 60-65 per cent of the country’s population lives in villages and hence the rural economy is to be accelerated with the mantra of “Sahkar Se Samridhi”.

Shah said that now PACS can start distribution work of LPG, Diesel and Petrol. They can also open Fair Price Shops, Jan Aushadhi Kendra, Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samridhi Kendra and Fertilizer shops.

Shah said that under the leadership of Prime Minister, the Ministry of Cooperation has recently taken a new initiative and started the refund process of depositors’ money stuck in the cooperative societies of Sahara Group.

He said the Ministry of Cooperation had filed a petition in the Supreme Court. On this application, the Supreme Court directed that Rs 5000 crore be transferred to the Central Registrar of Cooperative Societies (CRCS) from “Sahara-SEBI Refund Account” for payment of legitimate dues to the genuine depositors of the cooperatives of the Sahara group.

He said that following this direction, the ‘CRCS-Sahara Refund’ Portal was launched on 18 July, 2023. He said that till now five lakh people have registered on the portal and the process of refunding the money to the genuine depositors has started. He said that this is a great example of the fact that if a government works in a proactive manner, even the most complex problems can be solved.