The beleaguered agro- cooperative NAFED held its 58th AGM on Thursday at NCUI Auditorium in Delhi amidst looming uncertainties over its future. The Chairman V R Patel thanked the agriculture ministry in general and Radha Mohan in particular for continued support to NAFED.
The challenges before Nafed are manifold as of now. The lending banks have moved Debt Recovery Tribunal for recovery of their outstanding dues of around Rs 1700 crores. Nafed’s efforts to recover dues from parties which owe it, have met with limited success.
Recently against one tie-up party in Mumbai, with the help of High Court it is likely to recover Rs 125 crore. In case of another dry fruit tie-up party in Delhi, Nafed has already auctioned one of its properties and recovered Rs 20 crores.
However, its efforts to recover Rs 20 thousand crore is moving at snail’s pace given labyrinthine legal course in the country.
Meanwhile, its efforts to get interest free loan from the govt has also met with little success so far. Way back in March 2015 the senior cooperators connected with the agri-cooperative have met the Prime Minister Mr Narendra Modi and asked him to intervene. Even during AGM, its Vice-Chairman Bijender Singh said that though he is a congressman himself, he has greater hope from Modi and BJP.
Last month on August 5, State Union Minister Mohan Bhai Kunderia presided over a meeting attended by officials of Agricultural Ministry, Dept of Expenditure, Dept of Financial Services, a few lender banks and MD of NAFED.
A revised proposal was submitted in this meeting requesting the govt in getting the OTS done with the banks and to give the entire settlement amount as interest free loan or grant. In addition, Nafed also made a request of annual grant of Rs 30 crore for a period of 5 years to meet the salaries of employees and administrative expenses.
After detailed deliberations a Committee of concerned officers was set up to study the proposal and make suitable recommendations to be taken to the Cabinet.
As recently as last week the Union Finance Minister called a meeting of all the stake-holders for discussing possibilities of revival of Nafed, the Chairman informed the general body. Arun Jaitley is believed to have assured of sympathetic consideration.
But what ultimately would decide Nafed fate is resolution of the tussle between cooperative autonomy and govt’s desire of enhanced control. AGM was informed by the Board members that whatever happens would happen only within the ambit of MSCS Act 2002.
While Bijender exhorted the BJP leaders on Nafed Board to impress upon the govt, Chandra Pal said that besides govt support the share-holders should also pull up their sleeves to help out the beleaguered co-operative.
But all agreed that Nafed is one of its kinds and must be saved at all costs.
