Govt should refrain from interfering in co-ops: NCUI Prez

Chandra Pal Singh Yadav, President of National Cooperative Union of India has demanded that the govt should refrain from interfering in the affairs of cooperatives and instead help them with relaxing their Income Tax burden. He was speaking at Annual General Meeting held on Monday in its headquarters in Delhi.

In his address on the occasion, Chairman of the apex body Dr Chandra Pal Singh Yadav touched on various burning issues including the 97th Constitutional Amendment, Umbrella Organization, Income Tax, Cooperative Banks and many other things relevant to the cooperative sector.

Jyotindra Mehta, Govt nominee, Balvinder Singh Nakai IFFCO Director and some other Directors were conspicuous by their absence in the AGM. It was thinly attended leading Biscomaun Chairman Sunil Singh to comment “ in a country of 25 crore cooperators NCUI AGM is a poor show; lets us ask successful co-ops such as IFFCO and Kribhco to foot the bill of railways fare for the delegates from next time”.

Sitting between two Vice-presidents Bijender Singh and GH Amin, Chandra Pal was however, enjoying the diatribes of Sunil as several other leaders kept egging him on to speak after introducing himself first before the audience.

Chandra Pal Yadav said “We all know that India’s Cooperative movement is the largest cooperative movement of the world. Cooperative Societies are providing urea, fertilizer, credit at cheap rate to the farmers of the country and no one neither the public sector nor the private sector can rival the power of these societies. The latter are playing a pivotal role in the country’s economy, Yadav noted.

He also talked about the crisis-ridden NAFED and thanked the government for green lighting a bail-out for the agri cooperative. NCUI has decided to form a committee of experts from among experienced and knowledgeable cooperative leaders, Yadav revealed.

Yadav said NCUI through its educational institutions has organized many training programmes for cooperators.

Several cooperators present on the occasion included K.Sivadasan Nair, Virendra Singh, Rajendra Negi, Vishal Singh, Ashok Dabas, Vinay Shahi, Lakhan Lal Shahu, Ramesh Bung, Ramhutt, NCUI officials and several others.

NCUI Chief Executive officer N.Satyanaryana presented the agenda report and welcomed directors and delegates drawn from different states.

In his speech, Cooperative Bank of Rajkot, MD, Kamal Dhami was critical of the government’s attitude towards cooperatives underscoring the need to protest. Issue of women co-option in the NCUI GC was also raised strongly.

NCUI Vice Chairman Bijendra Singh proposed a vote of thanks.