Karang Island declared as Country’s first cashless island

Our Correspondent
Imphal, August 23 (EMN): India’s first social voluntary cashless promotion organisation was formed in Manipur on Tuesday. According to report, exactly after seven months Karang, a small lake island in Manipur was declared as the country’s first cashless island. The organisation ‘Karang Island Cashless Promotion Society’ was formed by the people of Karang Island and Thanga Part 1 Gram Panchayat both under Bishnupur District, Manipur.
“The society is considered to be the India’s first social voluntary cashless promotion society,” said district manager Prasanta Oinam of Common Service Centre (CSC) in Bishnupur who initiated the programme. CSC Village Level Entrepreneur (VLE) N Pradeep Singh and VLE S Meiteisana Meetei were the executive members of the society while Prasanta Oinam of CSC Bishnupur, National awardees K Bimolkumar Singh and O Maipakchao Singh were the advisors.
The two main objectives of the society include promotion of cashless transaction particularly in Karang area and far and wide besides transformation of Karang Island into a digital empowered Island, and knowledge economy. Earlier the Union Ministry of electronics and information technology under its digital India programme declared Karang as the first cashless island in India on January 13 this year after the island fulfilled Centre’s necessary criteria in a campaign which run from January 9-12. Karang Island is located in the middle of Loktak, the largest freshwater lake in Northeast India. Akodara, a village in Gujarat, had attained the unique status to be India’s first digital village in 2015.