Glossary
Plain definitions of the terms used in Indian co-operative and daily-deposit banking, from patpedhi to DICGC.
Co-operative bank
A co-operative that also holds a banking licence, which is what brings deposit insurance and Reserve Bank supervision. The word co-operative alone brings neither.
Credit co-operative society
A co-operative that lends and takes deposits without a banking licence. Lawful, common, often the collector at the door, and outside deposit insurance entirely.
Daily deposit scheme
A daily deposit scheme is a savings account built on small daily cash collection at your door; pigmy deposit is the traditional name for it.
DICGC
DICGC insures bank deposits, including co-operative banks, up to ₹5,00,000 per depositor, but not co-operative societies or Nidhi companies.
District central co-operative bank (DCCB)
A DCCB is a district-level co-operative bank, common in Karnataka, that offers pigmy or daily-deposit accounts alongside ordinary banking.
Doorstep banking
Doorstep banking is RBI's framework for banking services delivered at a customer's home or shop, of which pigmy cash collection is one service.
Know Your Customer (KYC)
KYC is the identity and address verification a bank must complete before opening any account, including a pigmy or daily-deposit account.
Ministry of Cooperation
The union ministry created in 2021 that now sets national co-operative policy, funds PACS computerisation, and plans two lakh new societies in five years.
Multi-state co-operative society
A society operating across more than one state, registered under central law with the Central Registrar rather than a state one, amended in 2023.
NABARD
The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development refinances the co-operative credit structure and is the implementing agency for the project computerising 63,000 village societies.
Nidhi company
A Nidhi company is a non-banking finance company under the Companies Act 2013 that borrows and lends only among its own members.
Nitya Nidhi Deposit
The Nitya Nidhi Deposit is Canara Bank's daily-collection savings product, successor to Syndicate Bank's 1928 Pigmy Deposit Scheme.
Patpedhi
A patpedhi is a Maharashtra credit co-operative society, not a bank, that commonly runs a daily-deposit or pigmy-style collection scheme.
Pigmy agent
A pigmy agent collects daily cash deposits door to door on behalf of a bank or society, paid by commission rather than salary.
Pigmy deposit
A pigmy deposit is a savings account where an agent visits your home or shop daily to collect cash, which earns interest until maturity.
Primary Agricultural Credit Society (PACS)
A PACS is the smallest, village-level co-operative credit institution in India; Pigmity found no evidence PACS run branded pigmy schemes.
Recurring deposit
A recurring deposit is a fixed-instalment account funded by standing instruction, unlike a pigmy deposit, which is collected in cash at the door.
Registrar of Co-operative Societies
The Registrar of Co-operative Societies regulates credit co-operatives, patpedhis and Souharda co-operatives, distinct from RBI's supervision of banks.
Short-term co-operative credit structure (STCC)
The three-tier arrangement that carries rural credit in India: village societies at the base, district banks above them, a state bank at the top, with NABARD behind it.
Souharda co-operative
A Souharda co-operative is a Karnataka society registered under the Karnataka Souharda Sahakari Act, 1997, a separate law from the state's main Act.
State co-operative bank (StCB)
The apex co-operative bank in a state, sitting above the district banks and below NABARD, and covered by deposit insurance like any other co-operative bank.
UCB tier
A UCB tier is the size category, Tier 1 to 4, RBI uses to decide what an urban co-operative bank may do, including using agents for pigmy collection.
Unregulated deposit scheme
A deposit-taking scheme run for business without registration by a recognised regulator, the target of a Bill Parliament passed in July 2019.
Urban co-operative bank (UCB)
A UCB is a co-operative society licensed to do banking business in a town or city, regulated jointly by RBI and a Registrar of Co-operative Societies.