NCUI arbitration case hearing took place on Friday in Agriculture Ministry. The petitioners have charged that election process to the apex body was not carried in free and fair manner.

Central Registrar had appointed Mr Sanjiv Gupta as the arbitrator. Mr Gupta was hamstrung for long as necessary support staff was not made available to him. On Friday the petition of Mr Rajendra Sharma against the election of President of NCUI Chandra Pal Singh Yadav came up for hearing.

Mr Sharma, a resident of Himachal Pradesh has challenged the election of Chandra Pal Singh Yadav. NCUI President’s advocate sought four weeks of time to file reply. The next date of hearing is scheduled on 3^rd of June.

According to by laws of NCUI Election process, only duly elected members of a society could be President of NCUI. Mr Chandra Pal is a nominated member from  Kribhco.

Other issues pertain to mixing of constituency in arbitrary manner.The high profile Mudit Verma filed nomination as miscellaneous candidate though he represents multi states cooperative society.The same is true of Sunil Singh of Biscomaun which though is a multi state cooperative society but gets representation as Land Development bank.

Such mixing of constituency,sources say,is not out of innocence.It has been done to enhance the winning chances of certain candidates as they stood lesser chance in their parent constituency.

Effort to contact Arbitrator Sanjiv Gupta could not succeed so far.

Biscomaun represented by Chairman  Sunil Singh made a strong appeal to Central Registrar to grant  multi state cooperative society status to Biscomaun.

Central Registrar rejected his petition on the ground of an enquiry wherein it was found that Biscomaun has operations confined to only 2 states and hence cannot be given the status of multi state cooperative society.

Biscomaun’s  candidature was also rejected as  NOC from state government was not acquired.Central Registrar cited this as a must for consideration of petition.

There were other reasons behind the rejection by Central Registrar. Sunil Singh, the Chairman of Biscomaun reportedly did not seek AGM approval of the petition before putting it in front of Central Registrar.

It has been said that Sunil Singh was accompanied by Mudit Verma , one of the governing council members of NCUI to lend strength to his appeal. But Central Registrar R K Tiwary remained unimpressed.

NCCF Board is meeting today on Friday in the backdrop of tense phase.In the last meeting some retired officials’ presence was resented by some of the board memebers and they were asked to be sent packing by 31st March.

According to NCCF chairman Birendra Singh such officials have been seen off since.

Other issues pertain to selling off of NCCF properties which was not approved by a number of Board members.

But according to information received by Indiancooperative.com a truce has been found between members and Chairman.

Talking to Indian Cooperative.com,NCCF Chairman Birendra Singh said that the meeting is a routine one and nothing much should be read into it.

But it is said that Birendra Singh’s rising clout with IFFCO is being resented by many board members.Readers may be aware that IFFCO is continually on growth path with little interest in cooperative politics going around. There is also concerted effort to isolate IFFCO from the mainstream and any attempt by any leader to associate with IFFCO is not liked by so called bearers of mantle of  Cooperative movement.

Birendra Singh,sources say, is paying price for it. He is constantly kept uneasy at NCCF and attempt to dethrone him looms large all the time.

Burglars made a futile attempt to loot an agricultural co operative bank at nearby Muthialpatty of gold ornaments and cash in Namakkal.

The bank secretary A Govindan said the culprits gained entry to the strong room by digging a hole in the wall and tried to break open an iron chest containing the ornaments and cash.

However the alarm went off, scaring them and they made good their escape, police said.

The Delhi High Court directed the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) to probe alleged financial irregularities of Rs.900 crore in the functioning of the National Agricultural Marketing Federation of India (NAFED).

Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Sanjiv Khanna directed the CAG to appraise the court whether the accounts of NAFED from 2001 onwards have been audited or not.

The court observation came while hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Vikas Jain.

The matter will be now heard May 25.

Jain’s counsel Sugriva Dubey said that NAFED had diverted around Rs.3,700 crore meant for farmers to its other businesses.

‘As per their own estimation, NAFED has to recover Rs.1,600 crore from persons who were given loans by it,’ Dubey said.

The Supreme Court had earlier set aside the high court order directing a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the alleged financial irregularities by NAFED officials in various activities, including the procurement of mustard seeds.

The high court had directed the investigating agency to register a case against erring NAFED officials.

NAFED has filed an interim application demanding the court vacate its stay on selling properties in posh locations across the country and said that it is reeling under a financial crisis and demanded government’s help to overcome this.

Visakhapatnam District Central Co-op Bank in Andhra Pradesh has tied up with ING Life India to offer one more product to its customer.

The Bank has more than 60,000 customers whom ING Life India can approach  through its 28 branches spread across many districts of Andhra Pradesh.

Such districts are Visakhapatnam, Anakapalli, Narsipatnam and Yelamanchili.

ING Life India Director sales Mr Uthappa  said that ING Life India has a strong network of tie-ups with co-operative banks across India. We have been keen to develop our network in Andhra Pradesh, and this tie-up gives us the right start in the region to reach out to customers.

Visakhapatnam District Central Co-op Bank is the fifth district central cooperative bank that the company has tied up with in AP.

“With the tie up we will now be able to add one more service to our customers by offering life insurance products,said Bank Chairman, B Satya Rao.

The panel of NCP’s Sunil Funde, supported by BJP MLA Nana Patole, retained reins of power in the elections of Bhandara District Central Cooperative Bank (BDCCB) in Maharashtra.

It won all 21 seats of directors. Earlier, 11 directors were elected unanimously and remaining ten candidates of the panel registered victory in the election held on Sunday.

Funde is the immediate past president of BDCCB. The surprising result was former MLA and senior BJP leader Madhukar Kukde losing the election.

The panel of NCP’s Sunil Funde, supported by BJP MLA Nana Patole, retained reins of power in the elections of Bhandara District Central Cooperative Bank (BDCCB). It won all 21 seats of directors.

Majority of Multi State Cooperative Societies have their board meetings in the last week of April. Kribhco board is meeting on Wednesday. Its Chairman Bagchi Bhia Patel was in Mumbai en route to Delhi when Indian Cooperative.com contacted him to find out the agenda of meeting.

Talking to this correspondent Bagchi Bhia said that there is no special issue on the agenda and the board meeting is a routine one.

NCUI’s Governing Council is also meeting on Wednesday and effort to contact Mr Chandra Pal Singh Yadav failed as he was likely to be onboard  the train. This would be the first time the new Chief Executive Dr Dinesh Mishra would participate in the meeting.

NAFED  Board is also meeting on Thursday. Beleaguered by scams, the Board is trying hard to restore the lost glory of agri cooperative.

NCCF Board is meeting on Friday and is expected to be stormy. The tension in the NCCF Board has not lessened since election time when a compromise between Vishal Singh and the present Chairman Virendra Singh was worked out.

Virendra Singh was earlier forced to nominate Vishal Singh on the board of NCUI, a position traditionally claimed by the incumbent Chairman.

The board members also objected to the presence of many retired officials on the pay roll of NCCF. Though such officials have been removed , the tension on many issues continue.

The annual general meeting of IFFCO is also slated on May 16 when the assembly members from across the states would come to Delhi. The agenda of meeting is sent in advance and participants are expected to contribute their views.

A new type of green revolution has begun in Gujarat. Four years ago, the 17 Milk Unions affiliated with Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF better known as Amul) decided to launch a mass tree plantation programme involving each and every member milk producer. In last four years, milk producers of Amul have planted around 235 lakhs tree saplings in Gujarat.

This initiative of farmers has been recognised nationally and internationally. GCMMF (Amul), has won Srishtis G-Cube (G3- Good Green Governance) award 2010 in Service Category for fourth consecutive times.

This “Amul Green” movement has also been awarded by International Dairy Federation for best environment initiative in the “sustainability category”.

Entire programme is initiated & executed by 30 lakh milk producer farmer members of the dairy cooperatives in 15,000 villages of the state. Each member takes oath to plant saplings and ensure that it grows in to a tree.

Milk producers of Gujarat is not only producing milk, but by this green initiative, they are demonstrating their concern & commitment for betterment of environment.

The Delhi High Court has rapped Registrar of Cooperative Societies (RCS) for the over five year delay in holding a draw of lots for flats here as the list of members of a housing society was not forwarded to the DDA even after verification of documents.

“We are pained to note that other than calling upon us to repeatedly pass the same kind of orders and causing wastage of judicial time, the RCS appears to be doing nothing. “Once the principles are set out by this court and accepted, there is no reason why every society must keep on approaching this court for holding a draw of lots and for seeking allotment.

The legal position having been settled, the RCS should have volunteered to forward the names to DDA,” a division bench headed by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said.

The court asked RCS to forward names of members to the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) for holding a draw within 10 days, besides imposing a fine of Rs 10,000. The RCS was also asked to pay the fine to Jai Bhawani Cooperative Group Housing Society Ltd (Dwarka) in 15 days.

The group housing society, in its petition, alleged that RCS has been sitting over the list of members even after the verification process. It alleged RCS was not forwarding the list to DDA for holding a draw of lots, causing harassment to the members.

“We are thus of the view that RCS must be penalised for such conduct and we have put to learned counsel for RCS to notice that the costs which we seek to impose now would continue to escalate for every such repeated stand taken by the RCS contrary to our directions, which is really contumacious in character and would be from the personal account of RCS,” the court said.

The RCS said it was not forwarding the list to DDA due to the fact that the CBI did not file the charge sheet in a criminal case pertaining to the housing society. Terming the situation as “anarchic”, the court cited its various judgements in similar cases saying RCS should have allowed the draw of lots.

“We have repeatedly emphasised to RCS through various court orders about the almost anarchic situation which is sought to be created by conduct of RCS. This court has been faced with repeated examples of self-draws being held by members, frustrated with the approach of RCS,” it said.

The Society was offered land by DDA in 1998 at Sector 22, Dwarka. On completion of 90 per cent construction, it sent a letter to RCS proposing allotment of flats to 69 members. Despite this, the names were not forwarded to DDA and the members are hanging fire for more than 5 years since December, 2005, the court said.