THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Though the demonetisation drive had squeezed the co operative sector in the state of its ability to support the depositors, the deposit mobilisation campaign came handy for the Primary Agricultural Co operative Societies(PACS), Urban Banks and District Co operative Banks to check the migration of depositors to commercial banks.
While the campaign did not help to mobilise large deposits compared to the previous years, it helped to boost the confidence of the depositors and bring the deposits back.
According to Cooperation Minister Kadakampally Surendran, the members and general public joined hands to help the co operative sector survive the challenge and win back the trust of the people.
Surendran told Express despite the propaganda the cooperative societies were dens of black money, a majority of the depositors stood by the cooperative sector during hard times.
“While the PACS, the Urban Banks and District Co operative Banks had deposits to the tune of around `1.5 lakh crore, only `5,000 crore was withdrawn in the post demonetisation scenario,” he said.
The minister, however, admitted the month-long deposit mobilisation campaign launched by the cooperative banks had not evoked much response.
“There were instances where people deposited only `1,000 to `10,000 with the PACS in Kozhikode district. After I joined the campaign, we succeeded in attracting deposits and a PACS in Kozhikode received `2.5 lakh deposit in a single day,” he said.
Registrar of Cooperatives S Lalithambika told Express the response to the deposit mobilisation campaign was not inspiring.
“Though we were expecting to mobilise `5,000 crore to `6000 crore, we couldn’t get anywhere near the target. But the campaign helped us to boost the confidence of the depositors and arrest the trend of withdrawal of deposits,” she said.
However, additional registrar Jose Philip told Express they hadn’t fixed any target as such.
“People stopped complaining after the government withdrew the curbs on withdrawals. As of now there is no crisis,” he said.
Jose Philip also said the Reserve Bank of India had exchanged all the demonetised currency notes collected by the cooperative banks.