After the Supreme Court on Wednesday allowed a plea by the Centre seeking allocation of ₹5,000 crore out of the Sahara-SEBI fund for refund of deposits of nearly 10 crore investors of the four Sahara group co-operative societies, the Co-operative Ministry said that it will complete the payment process in 9 months.
The direction of the apex court’s Bench of Justices MR Shah and CT Ravikumar came on an application filed by the ministry for the refund. Directing the government that the amount should be disbursed to depositors duped by the Sahara group of cooperative societies, the Bench also said that the entire process will be monitored by former SC judge Justice R Subhash Reddy.
Four Sahara group societies — Sahara Credit Cooperative Society Limited, Saharayan Universal Multipurpose Society Limited, Humara India Credit Cooperative Society Limited, and Stars Multipurpose Cooperative Society Limited — were registered under the Multi-State Cooperative Societies Act, 2010 between March 2014 and January 2002, the ministry said in a statement.
After a large number of complaints were received from all over the country regarding non-payment of deposits to the depositors of these cooperative societies, notices were issued to the co-operatives and hearing was held before the Central Registrar. The Central Registrar had directed the involved cooperatives to pay the dues of the investors and barred them from accepting new deposits and renewing existing deposits.
The Ministry of Cooperation digitised about 1.22 lakh claims received from the depositors and sent them to these cooperatives for payment, but these societies did not follow the direction.
After the SC order, the Central Registrar will complete the payment process in nine months under the supervision of the justice Reddy and with the assistance of Gaurav Agarwal, Advocate, the ministry said. The payment will be made through a transparent process to the legitimate investors of Sahara group’s societies into their bank accounts on the basis of proper proof of their identity and deposit.