SHG Digital Bookkeeping: Who Approves Entries and Access

When an SHG moves its books to a mobile app, the safest setup separates three jobs: one person enters the transactions, a different office bearer checks them against the cash and the paper minute book, and the group meeting approves anything that moves money, such as a new loan. Every user gets a personal login on a known phone, access is removed the day someone leaves a role, and every member can see her own balance. This article explains how to set that up, with a worked example of one meeting. Rules here are general practice as of November 2026; your state rural livelihoods mission or bank may set its own instructions, and those come first.

Why approval matters more once books go digital

Under DAY-NRLM, state missions are moving SHG records onto LokOS, the Ministry of Rural Development's app for SHGs and their federations, and NABARD's EShakti project has digitised SHG records in many districts. Digital books make totals instant and help banks see a group's history, which can help with credit linkage. They also bring new risks:

• An entry typed once can flow into balances, loan eligibility and reports without anyone reading it aloud.
• One person with the phone and the password can change records without others knowing.
• A shared login means nobody can tell who made a wrong entry.
• Members who are not comfortable with phones may stop checking their own balances.

Paper books had a natural check: the register was read out and signed in front of everyone. A digital system needs that check designed in on purpose.

The four roles every group should name

If your app or mission uses different names, map them to these four jobs. The principle is called maker-checker: no money entry becomes final until a second person has looked at it.

Small groups

In a 10-member group the bookkeeper may also be an office bearer. That is workable if:

1. The person who enters is never the only person who confirms.
2. The meeting summary (total savings, repayments, new loans, cash in hand, bank deposit) is read aloud and signed by at least two office bearers.
3. Office bearers rotate as your group's rules or the mission's guidelines suggest.

Setting up access the right way

Logins and phones

• One person, one login. Never share a password or PIN between the bookkeeper and an office bearer.
• Register which phone is used. Write the phone owner's name and number in the minute book.
• Lock the phone with a PIN or pattern not known to others.
• Do not use a family member's phone that others in the house can open freely.
• Keep the app updated only from the official app store listing or as instructed by your block staff.

When someone leaves a role

The most common gap is a former bookkeeper whose login still works. When a bookkeeper or office bearer changes:

1. Record the change by resolution in the meeting.
2. Ask the block or cluster staff who manage the app to deactivate the old login and create a new one.
3. Hand over the paper registers with a signed list.
4. Check the last month's app balances against the cash and bank passbook before the new person starts.

Personal data

The app will hold names, phone numbers and often Aadhaar and bank details. Show full details only to those whose role needs them. Do not photograph member documents on a personal phone gallery and forward them on chat groups. India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 makes organisations that collect personal data responsible for protecting it; ask your mission staff how the app stores members' data and who can see it.

What the meeting should approve, and how

Write down, once, which decisions need the group's approval and record each in the minute book:

Corrections deserve special care. Never delete a wrong entry silently. Make a reversing entry or use the app's correction feature, and note in the minute book what was wrong, who corrected it and when. Our guide on recording loans between members shows what each loan record should contain.

Worked example: one monthly meeting with a maker-checker check

Jyoti Mahila SHG has 12 members who each save ₹200 a month. Before the meeting, cash in hand is ₹1,200. Internal loans outstanding are ₹30,000 at 1% a month.

What happens at the meeting:

• Savings collected: 12 × ₹200 = ₹2,400
• Internal loan principal repaid: ₹3,000
• Interest on internal loans: 1% of ₹30,000 = ₹300
• New internal loan given to one member (approved by resolution): ₹4,000

Correct cash position:

The bookkeeper enters everything in the app. In a hurry she records one member's savings twice, so the app shows savings of ₹2,600 and closing cash of ₹3,100.

The check: the secretary counts the cash box: ₹2,900. The app says ₹3,100. The ₹200 difference is exactly one member's savings, so the secretary reads out each member's saving entry and finds the duplicate. The bookkeeper reverses it, the app now shows ₹2,900, and both sign the meeting summary.

Without the count, member Kavita's savings would have shown ₹200 more than she paid, and the group would have believed it had ₹200 it never received. Across 12 months, small slips like this can make savings and loan balances unreliable just when the group applies for bank credit. The month-end bank side of this check is covered in our guide on reconciling the SHG passbook with the ledger.

The new ₹4,000 loan is the second control: it was given only after a resolution with the amount and repayment terms, not because the bookkeeper typed it in.

Step-by-step checklist for going digital

1. Pass a resolution naming the bookkeeper, the checker and the authorised bank signatories.
2. Get the app set up through official channels: your cluster or block staff, CRP or bank. Do not download look-alike apps from links shared on chat groups.
3. Enter opening balances (savings per member, internal loans, bank loan, cash, bank balance) and have the checker match each to the paper registers and the passbook.
4. Fix a meeting routine: collect, count, enter, read out, sign.
5. Read out each member's balance at least once a quarter, or more often if the app shares it with members directly.
6. Reconcile with the bank passbook every month.
7. Review access every six months and whenever an office bearer changes.
8. Report problems in writing to the CRP or block staff and keep a copy.

Red flags

Where to go for help

• App or login problems: your CRP, cluster coordinator or block mission management unit (BMMU) under the state rural livelihoods mission.
• Disputes about entries inside the group: raise them in the meeting first, then with the village organisation or cluster level federation.
• Bank account or passbook problems: the branch manager, then the bank's grievance redressal officer; if not resolved in 30 days, the RBI Integrated Ombudsman at cms.rbi.org.in.
• Suspected fraud or misuse of funds: write to the block office and keep a copy; if money was taken through phone or online fraud, report at cybercrime.gov.in or call 1930.

For how savings, loan funds and grants should sit under separate heads in the books, see SHG savings vs loan fund records. If you are planning bank credit, the EMI calculator helps the group test whether an instalment fits its repayment capacity, and our NRLM SHG loan guide explains the bank linkage process.

Key takeaways

• Separate entering, checking and approving: one maker, a different checker, and the meeting as approver for loans and large expenses.
• Give every user a personal login on a known phone and remove access the day a role changes.
• Count cash and match it with the app at every meeting; in the example a ₹200 duplicate was caught that way.
• Correct mistakes with a recorded reversal, never a silent deletion.
• Keep the signed minute book and reconcile with the bank passbook every month.