COP-5 Financial Assistance to Agricultural Credit Co-operative Banks (PACS/LAMPS) for Reconstruction and Reestablishment (General/Tribal Area)

What is COP-5 assistance to PACS and LAMPS?

COP-5 Financial Assistance to Agricultural Credit Co-operative Banks (PACS / LAMPS) for Reconstruction and Reestablishment is a state scheme of the Agriculture, Farmers Welfare and Co-operation Department, Government of Gujarat, implemented through the Commissionerate of Co-operation and the Registrar of Co-operative Societies. The scheme provides financial assistance to Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS) and Large-sized Agricultural Multi-Purpose Societies (LAMPS) so that societies that have become weak or defunct can be rebuilt and put back into working order. Separate provision is made for societies in general areas and in tribal areas.

PACS sit at the bottom of India's three-tier short-term co-operative credit structure. The state co-operative bank at the top, the district central co-operative banks in the middle, and the primary societies in the village. LAMPS play the same role in thinly populated tribal blocks, with a wider mandate that covers input supply and produce marketing alongside credit. When a village society stops functioning, the farmers attached to it lose their nearest source of crop loan and fall back on informal lenders. Reviving the society is cheaper for the state than replacing it.

Gujarat has a dense co-operative base to work with. The Ministry of Co-operation has reported 5,754 Primary Agricultural Credit Societies in Gujarat undergoing computerisation under the national project, with roughly Rs 4 lakh of assistance per society for hardware, software and training. Gujarat's 2025-26 co-operation budget carried a provision of about Rs 1,453 crore, of which Rs 1,296.10 crore was earmarked for assistance to credit co-operatives, Rs 3.95 crore for the formation of new PACS and Rs 5.49 crore as financial incentive. COP-5 sits inside this larger effort as the revival component.

Who is eligible for COP-5 assistance?

These applicants can apply:

• Primary Agricultural Credit Societies registered under the Gujarat Co-operative Societies Act.
• Large-sized Agricultural Multi-Purpose Societies operating in tribal blocks.
• Societies in general areas and in tribal areas, under the respective components of the scheme.
• Societies that are weak, dormant or loss-making and have a credible plan to return to viability, supported by their managing committee and their District Central Co-operative Bank.

These applicants cannot apply:

• Individual farmers, members and depositors cannot apply. There is no personal cash benefit under COP-5; the money goes to the institution.
• Unregistered village groups, informal self-help groups and private lending bodies are not eligible, because registration under the Co-operative Societies Act is the entry condition.
• Societies outside Gujarat, or societies whose registration has been cancelled and not restored.
• Societies that are already financially sound, since the scheme's stated purpose is reconstruction and reestablishment rather than general capital support.
• Societies that have not filed audited accounts, because the audit classification is what the Registrar's office uses to judge the case.

This is the point most readers get wrong. Searching for "COP-5 apply online" as a farmer leads nowhere. A farmer's route is to raise the state of the village society at its general body meeting and press the managing committee to file the proposal.

What documents does a society need?

How to apply for COP-5 assistance

1. Convene the managing committee of the society and pass a resolution deciding to seek assistance under the scheme, naming the office bearer authorised to sign and submit the proposal.
2. Complete the audit position. Get the pending statutory audits done and obtain the audit classification, because a proposal without audited accounts will not be taken up by the Registrar's office.
3. Prepare the reconstruction proposal. Explain plainly why the society became weak; overdues, deposit erosion, staff vacancy, loss of members: what the assistance will be used for, and how the society will return to lending and recovery.
4. Obtain the recommendation of the District Central Co-operative Bank to which the society is affiliated, since the DCCB carries the society's account and is expected to comment on its viability.
5. Submit the application on plain paper in the prescribed form with all annexures to the District Registrar of Co-operative Societies, and take an inward acknowledgement.
6. Respond to the Registrar's scrutiny. The district office examines the audit position, membership, area classification and the revival plan, and may call for clarifications or an inspection.
7. Receive the sanction and account for it. Once assistance is released against the year's budget provision, the society must use it for the sanctioned purpose and reflect it in the next audited accounts.

How to check the status of a society's application

1. Quote the inward number on the acknowledgement given by the District Registrar of Co-operative Societies when following up.
2. Ask the District Central Co-operative Bank as well, since the DCCB is usually kept in the loop on proposals from its affiliated societies.
3. Use the Registrar of Co-operative Societies portal, ecooperative.gujarat.gov.in, for society registration and compliance services and for district office contact details.
4. Escalate to the Commissionerate of Co-operation in Gandhinagar if a proposal has been pending for a full financial year without a decision.

Why proposals fail

• Statutory audits pending, so the society's financial position cannot be assessed.
• No District Central Co-operative Bank recommendation attached to the proposal.
• Managing committee not validly constituted, or elections long overdue.
• Revival plan is generic, with no numbers on overdues, recovery targets or member deposits.
• Budget provision for the year exhausted, so a sound proposal is carried over rather than refused.
• Society falls outside the general or tribal area classification claimed in the application.

How COP-5 fits with the national push on PACS

Since 2021 the Union Ministry of Co-operation has been converting PACS and LAMPS into multipurpose entities, amending decades-old bye-laws to let them enter more than 25 new activities including dairy, fisheries, warehousing, fair price shops and common service centres, and putting them on a common ERP platform linked through the district and state co-operative banks to NABARD. A society that takes COP-5 assistance to clear its way back to viability is in a far better position to take up those new activities afterwards. Gujarat's own budget language frames this as moving primary agricultural co-operative societies towards economic viability, benefiting more than one lakh farmer members associated with them.

Help and grievance redressal

• District Registrar of Co-operative Societies — receives the proposal and is the first point of contact for status and defects.
• Commissionerate of Co-operation and Registrar of Co-operative Societies, Gujarat. The escalation point, reachable through ecooperative.gujarat.gov.in.
• Agriculture, Farmers Welfare and Co-operation Department; agri.gujarat.gov.in for department contacts and circulars.
• District Central Co-operative Bank, for the financial position of the society and the recommendation required with the proposal.

No fee is payable to any government office for filing a COP-5 proposal, and no consultant can secure a sanction against an exhausted budget provision.