The efforts of Sahakar Bharati have finally come up with good results when the Himachal Pradesh Cooperative Societies (Amendment) Bill, 2020 was passed in the State Legislative Assembly last week with several amendments.
The development is not ordinary as it is going to be a part of history where future generations would be taught that Himachal Pradesh was the first state where the 97th Constitutional Amendment, which gives rights to form a cooperative society has been implemented.
The BJP led government in Himachal Pradesh has amended a half century old law that is the Himachal Pradesh Co-operative Societies Act, 1968. Though the bill was set to be passed in the Budget Session, due to Covid reasons, there was a delay.
A jubilant Sahakar Bharati state chief Vivek Jyoti said, This enactment has brought the dawn of transparency and democratization in the co-operative movement and an era of unnecessary and excessive control on the cooperative societies has come to an end.
According to the amendments, the Registrar, Co-operative societies is required to mandatorily register a cooperative society within a period of ninety days, on receiving an application to this effect after ensuring that such application is not contrary to the provisions of the Act and the Rules made thereunder.
Earlier, it was the discretion of the Registrar to register or refuse the registration. Further, the Registrar was empowered to refuse the registration if he was of the opinion that the proposed society had not reasonable chances of success. This amendment will, however, encourage the registration of new societies thereby strengthening the cooperative movement in the State. (Amendment of section 8).
The Registrar now cannot not refuse to register amendments carried out by the Co-operative societies in their bye-laws. This amendment will also be beneficial to the already existing societies willing to amend their bye-laws. Now all the societies may amend their bye-laws democratically and the Registrar cannot refuse to register such amendments (Amendment of section 11).
Prior to this amendment, the Registrar was empowered under section 11-A, to direct any co-operative society to amend its bye-laws. This was a cause of unnecessary interference in democratised functioning of the societies and in fact it was an instrument to control the cooperative societies. However, now this section has been completely omitted.
As per section 14-A, the Registrar was empowered to direct amalgamation, conversion and re-organisation of co-operative societies. This provision was against the basic cooperative principles. In fact, this was a tool in the hands of the Registrar to control the societies. The HP Government has omitted this section also.
Another important amendment is to allow the societies to receive deposits from its members only. In some cases, receiving deposits from the non-members was resulting in corruption and this was also against the cooperative principles.
The amendments have also drawn curtains on the inspectors’ rule in respect of the cooperatives. Now the Cooperative Societies will be free to select the auditors from the panel notified by the Government. A decision to select the auditor may be taken only in the general meeting of the society.
Talking to Indian Cooperative, after this historic development Marathe said “its beginning towards the implementation of the 97th Constitutional Amendment Act; Himachal is a small state but we hope to repeat the act in several other states sooner than later. Marathe had earlier visited the state to convince state leaders on the need to amend the law.