Sajal Roy had invested ₹1.60 lakh in a common service centre (CSC) of Sahaj e-Village programme at Ramgopalpur village, in South 24-Parganas district of West Bengal, in 2007, with the intention to offer e-governance services.

Unfortunately, the e-governance project did not take off in majority of the States, including Bengal. Roy had to depend on B2C initiatives — online bill payments, mobile top-up, computer education, insurance, etc — as a survival strategy. However, 2015 may finally bring about a difference to his fortune.

Game changer Following the introduction of the Jan Dhan scheme in August 2014, banks are in a rush to open kiosks in every village. Roy’s outlet will soon be doubling up as an SBI kiosk, helping him to attract major footfalls.

“It will be a game changer for the CSC operators,” admits Sanjay Kumar Panigrahi, CEO, Sahaj e-Village Ltd, a Srei Infrastructure Finance Ltd associate company. The hope is pinned on direct transfer of cash benefits (DBT) as kiosk owners will earn commission on transactions.

“It has started happening in UP,” he says.

Slow progress The financial inclusion programme is also expected to usher in new opportunities for Sahaj. With over 27,000 CSCs in six states (West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Tamil Nadu and Assam), Sahaj emerged as the largest service agency (SCA), for implementation of the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), way back in 2006.

But, lack of response from the States, saw the company bleeding with a net loss of ₹22.65 crore in 2013-14. Panigrahi says, only three states — Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Karnataka — were quick to implement NeGP.

As a survival strategy, Sahaj introduced a bouquet of B2C services. But, they didn’t prove enough to steer the company on profit path so far. Moreover, the company shared majority of the earnings from such services with the village level entrepreneur (VLE) to sustain the partnership.

Thankfully, for Sahaj, the Akhilesh Yadav government in UP started rolling out e-governance services since 2012.

There is little or no trace of G2C services in the other four States. Assam promised to start rolling out some services this month. West Bengal has missed many deadlines and is now expected to make a beginning in the middle of this year. Bihar is weighing the options.

Kiosk Banking Sahaj is now moving on a two-pronged strategy. It has already got a mandate for 7,231 kiosk banking centres. Of these, 4,420 are already in place with 7.13 lakh accounts opened so far.

As the transactions will start taking place on these accounts, CSCs will start experiencing major rise in footfalls paving way for enhancing sales of B2C services. The improved prospects also saw VLEs taking more interest in the business. According to the company balance-sheet, the absence of G2C services saw a substantial number of VLEs losing interest in the business. According to the company balance-sheet, 17,500 (64 per cent) out of 27,224 CSC operators are transacting entrepreneurs.

“The ratio has already improved and will improve further,” Panigrahi says.

Future challenges However, the future will not be free from challenges either.

The VLEs were selected on the basis of criteria set by the NeGP to offer G2C services. Naturally, many of them couldn’t adjust to B2C focus in the past as it required special skills and further investments. Those who had the extra edge did well.

Panigrahi feels that the VLEs will require mentorship for smooth operation of banking kiosks. But, a bigger challenge will evolve once the G2C services are launched by the States. It would be a task to balance the pressure, he feels.

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