The Centre has restored the Sahara Refund Portal to resume verification and processing of around 2 million pending claims from depositors of four Sahara Group cooperative societies, the Ministry of Cooperation said in an official statement on Tuesday.
The refund mechanism is being operated through the Central Registrar of Cooperative Societies (CRCS), with eligible payments transferred directly into Aadhaar-seeded bank accounts. The ministry said that Rs 9,267 crore has so far been refunded to around 4.2 million depositors.
The four societies covered by the process are Sahara Credit Cooperative Society, Saharayn Universal Multipurpose Society, Humara India Credit Cooperative Society and Stars Multipurpose Cooperative Society. Claims are being examined through a digital, paperless and verification-based system.
According to the ministry, the verification process uses Aadhaar electronic know-your-customer checks and matching of depositor, membership and bank-account details with records held by the societies. Deposit certificates and other prescribed documents are also scrutinised under the approved standard operating procedure.
The refund process had faced disruption because of operational and administrative difficulties involving information technology infrastructure, licences, hardware maintenance and manpower, the ministry said. The functioning of the cooperative societies was also affected in November 2025 after their premises were sealed in connection with matters that, according to the statement, were disconnected from the Sahara societies.
The ministry said it intervened to resolve the impediments and restore the systems needed for claim verification and processing. It did not provide a new completion date for the pending claims in the statement.
The refund portal was originally launched in July 2023 following a Supreme Court order to facilitate refunds to eligible depositors of the Sahara cooperative societies. The latest restoration is intended to allow the authorities to resume processing claims that remained pending during the disruption.
Depositors have been advised to use only the official CRCS-Sahara Refund Portal at mocrefund.crcs.gov.in when submitting fresh claims. The ministry said the resubmission portal at mocresubmit.crcs.gov.in should be used to rectify errors in claims that have already been submitted, whenever applicants are informed to do so.
Applicants have also been asked to follow the prescribed process and document requirements while submitting or resubmitting claims. The ministry said adherence to the official procedure would support timely verification and help protect applicants from unauthorised channels and misleading claims.
