SPARSH

• The Ministry of Defence, including the Defence Accounts

Department, is undergoing a major transformation with an
aim to bring transparency and efficiency in various
processes and procedures. With the broader agenda of
digitization and modernization of legacy systems, the
System for Pension Administration (Raksha)(SPARSH) as an
initiative of the Ministry of Defence was envisaged to
provide comprehensive solution to the administration of
pension to the Defence pensioners in line with the vision of
the Government of India of Digital India, Direct Benefit
Transfer(DBT) and Minimal Government, “Maximum
Governance”.
Project SPARSH
• The System for Pension Administration (Raksha)
(SPARSH) is an initiative of the Ministry of Defence
which aims at providing comprehensive solution to the
administration of pension to the defence pensioners in
line with the vision of the government of India of
Digital India, Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) and “Minimal
Government, Maximum Governance” as envisaged in
Para 126 of the Budget Speech of 2017-18
• “A comprehensive web based interactive
Pension Disbursement System for Defence
Pensioners will be established. This system
will receive pension proposals and make
payments centrally. This will reduce the
grievances of defence pensioners.”
•At the centre of this initiative is the Defence
Pensioner who will be given a completely
transparent view of his pension account through
a platform which will capture and maintain a
complete history of events and entitlements the
pensioner right from the date of commencement
of pension to the date of cessation of pension
due to his/her last eligible beneficiary.
• This system will be administered by the Defence Accounts
Department through the Principal Controller of Defence
Accounts (Pensions) , Prayagraj and shall cater to all the three
Services and allied organisations. The system will initially cater
to the new retirees on roll out and subsequently be extended to
cover the existing defence pensioners.
• The system would cater to all activities of the pension cycle
namely:
1.Initiation and Sanction
2.Disbursement
3.Revision
4.Service and Grievance Request Management
•The system will interface all the stakeholders and provide
a single source of truth there by ensuring transparency,
accountability and ease of doing business through
information dissemination, SLAs for various activities and
simplification of pension processes through Business
Process Re-engineering(BPR). The system will consist of
two portals one for the pensioner(SPARSH portal) and the
other for pension processing( SPARSH Back Office Portal).
These portals will have a mechanism for data exchange
between each other at set intervals so as to keep the
stakeholders updated
 The SPARSH Portal

• The SPARSH portal is established with the objective of empowering a Defence Pensioner
with regard to his pension account. This is a step towards disintermediation of services.
This portal ensures that the pensioner is in control of his pension account right from the
time he applies to avail his pension. A person who’s pension is due is onboarded on the
portal at the time of processing of his pension claim. The Pensioner is allotted a unique
account number once his digitised audited pension claim is ready for forwarding to
PCDA(Pensions) for issue of Pension Payment Order. The Pensioner is informed of this
account number on the mobile number/email address furnished by him at the time of
furnishing his pension claim which he can use to onboard on this portal. Once the Service
Record Holder and the corresponding Pay Accounts Office prepares the pension claim it is
made available to the pensioner on the portal for verification. This process is called
Pensioner Data Verification (PDV). PDV ensures that the pensioner has the final say with
respect to the information furnished to the Pension Sanction Authority. The Portal also
enables the pensioner to furnish the requisite declarations/ nominations/requests for
commutation. The portal also provides the option to the pensioner to use enabled
services for quicker processing of his requests and signing of declarations making his
experience a truly paperless and hassle free one.
•The SPARSH Portal provides the following facilities to the Pensioner
• Identification and furnishing of Life certificate through Manual
Certificate based process or Aadhaar Based Digital process.
• Management of Pensioner’s Profile
• Disbursement related services
• Service Requests
• Interactive Grievance Management
•The Portal features a simple and user friendly interface which can
be used by the pensioner . A mobile application has also been
envisaged to access the services . The pensioner will be notified of
events through his registered mobile/email address.
SPARSH Seva Kendras

•The SPARSH Seva Kendras are points of

contacts for the pensioners to avail the
services that are available through the
portal . These centres will provide
interface and assistance to the
Pensioner in the event of non-
availability to portal access.
• For performing identification pensioners are
requested to approach nearest CSC (
https://findmycsc.nic.in/) and get their annual
identification updated through Jeevan Pramaan
using SPARSH PPO number and selecting PDA as
SPARSH PCDA(P).

The SPARSH Portal may be accessed at

https://sparsh.defencepension.gov.in/
THANK YOU