NABARD: Committee on “Relevance of 3 tier credit system” meets

The First meeting of the Expert Committee constituted by the Ministry of Cooperation to conduct a Study on “Relevance, applicability and retention of three-tier Short Term Cooperative Credit Structures (STCS)” was held on Monday at the NABARD’s headquarters in Mumbai.

It was held under the chairmanship of Nabard Deputy Managing Director Shaji K V, in which RBI Central Board Director Satish Marathe, NCCT Secretary Mohan Mishra, Nafscob Managing Director Bhima Subrahmanyam were also present as its members.

The meeting lasted for more than two hours and participants deliberated on the relevance of a three-tier short term cooperative credit structure with respect to the Indian Cooperative Movement.

Talking to the Indian Cooperative, one of the participants said, “It was the first meeting after the constitution of the expert committee by the Ministry of cooperation. We have decided to draft a questionnaire which will be sent to the state cooperative banks, district central cooperative banks and a few PACCs to take their response on the three-tier structure”.

“Besides, the decision for holding a conference of representatives of apex banks, DCCBs in more than five places across India was taken in the meeting. It was one of the meetings in which the discussion was held on the applicability of three-tier Short term Cooperative Credit Structure in the country”, he underlined.

Soon after the meeting the members of the expert committee paid a courtesy call to Nabard Chairman G R Chintala.

It is worth mentioning that for the past many years, Sahakar Bharati has been raising a voice against the abolition of three tier structure but with the creation of a new ministry of cooperation, this has gained momentum and as a result an expert committee on this has been formed.

Readers would recall that last year in March, Sahakar Bharati had organized the conclave on the background of continuous attempts by various State Governments to compulsorily and undemocratically merge DCCBs into respective State CoOp Banks.

Meanwhile, there are few states like Kerala, Nagaland, Assam and others that have adopted the two-tier structure i.e. PACCs are directly accountable to the apex banks but in the case of Kerala Bank, we have seen that the formula of two tier structure has failed to take shape, said a cooperator.

The states like Punjab, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand are moving forward to adopt a two tier structure but so far the proposal is lying in the corridors of respective state secretariats.

 The newly constituted expert committee has been asked to submit the study report within three months.