As part of a move to fight for the rights of the cooperative sector and work towards getting the government to bring cooperative Centre-stage, the President of apex national cooperative body NCUI Dr Chandra Pal Singh Yadav has written a letter to Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
Reminding the minister of the fact that the cooperative sector in India represents six lakh cooperative societies and about 25 crore people Mr Yadav has requested that policy-makers must take this sector into account while finalizing the budget 2015-16.
Detailing the concerns of the cooperative sector Chandra Pal has demanded that in the past cooperatives enjoyed certain concessions in the matter of taxation. A considerable portion of income of cooperatives is remitted towards income tax and there is not enough left for the agricultural credit currently.
“Therefore, an appropriate intervention by the Hon Minister is requested for restoration of the exemptions allowed to cooperatives till 2006-7, under Section 80P of Income Tax Act,1961”, the letter reads.
Yadav has also written on Section 43D presently applicable only on scheduled banks and has demanded its extension on non-scheduled cooperative banks.”It is learnt that under the new Finance Bill deposits of members with cooperative banks will also come under the tax net for TDS which so far was exempted”. He has asked for relief in this matter also.
Chandra Pal’s letter touches upon several issues including taxation of foreign dividends at reduced rate for multi state cooperatives and has reminded the govt of its commitment to encourage joint ventures in countries with cheaper and abundant reserves of raw materials.
NCUI President has also demanded extension of investment allowance to cooperative sector in manufacturing sector. He has argued that there is no merit in restricting the benefits to companies alone and has demanded inclusion of cooperatives into this. Yadav has also batted for extending benefits under FEMA regulations to cooperatives.
Besides the IT exemption, another important exemption sought by the NCUI President included exemption for
service tax and other levies for cooperative education and training. He has also sought governmental intervention in re-furbishing the cooperative training institutes in the country which are quite old and are suffering from lack of fund for their proper maintenance.
Chandra Pal has also lauded the role being played by NCUI’s Field Projects and has sought its further strengthening. Similarly he has advocated recapitalization of PACS and reminded the Minister that out of Rs 13592 cr promised for them only Rs 9858 cr was spent leaving some 29000 PACS high and dry.
Lastly he has also pitched in for taking cooperative onboard when it comes to Make in India or Skill India. “Cooperative would not lag behind in the execution of Prime Minister’s dream projects”, he later told Indian Cooperative on phone.
