Unfazed by the grueling experience of fund crunch currently affecting the NCCT, the apex body of co-op training held its General Council meeting in the Krishi Bhawan on Wednesday where a host of issues were discussed.
Presided over by the Union Minster Radha Mohan Singh the meeting decided to make a fresh pitch to secure Corpus Find from NCUI, sources say. The meeting also saw signing of an MoU with IRMA to boost co-op training. It also deliberated on computerization of PACS with the help of NCDC.
“It is not the question of securing interest from the Corpus Fund but since the Corpus Fund was conceived in the first place as a fund for cooperative training, NCCT has the natural claim over it”, said Satish Marathe who is seen as one of the architects of the NCCT in its new avatar.
The meeting entrusted Mrs Vasudh Mishra, Additional Secretary with the job of negotiating with the NCUI on the issue of release of fund. Mrs Mishra had earlier sat with the teams from both NCUI and NCCT to solve the matter as earlier reported in these columns.
NCUI sources, however, say the efforts to snatch Corpus Fund had been there since the beginning and it was one of the reasons why NCUI went to court. “The hearing is scheduled for tomorrow on January 11. Neither the Ministry nor the NCUI can have a final say in the matter when the court is hearing the case”, sources underlined.
The NCUI team had assured Additional Secretary Mrs Mishra of putting the issue of fund for NCCT before the Governing Council meeting of NCUI but the meeting is not going to take place in the near future. According to NCUI’s calendar the GC meeting is slated for February end and by then how would NCCT run its affairs and pay salaries is a big question.
Besides the issue of fund crunch, other issues that came up during the NCCT General Council meeting were presentation of the annual report and reviewing the same by the members. Speaking on the occasion Union Minister Singh said that VAMNICOM at the national level and five regional cooperative management institutes in Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Gandhinagar, Kalyani and Patna at the regional level and 14 cooperative management institutes in various parts of the country meet training requirements of senior and middle employees working in cooperative departments and organizations.
The council has trained 46203 participants in 1340 programs by its various training units till December 2018, he added.
Referring to the Swaminathan Report on creating a professional body for cooperative training and capacity building in cooperatives, Satish Marathe said that an MoU with IRMA was signed on the occasion. Prof Mishra of IRMA was made the head of the committee on the training policy. NCCT would achieve its aim of creating a brigade of well-trained cooperators in the country, Marathe asserted.
In the General Council meeting NCDC MD Mr Sundeep Nayak also pledged financial support for the computerization of PACS through state and DCCBs, informed Marathe. “MD offered soft loan for the purpose”, added Marathe.
The General Council meeting was attended by more than twenty people with representations from states also. Union State Minister Parshottam Rupala could not make it to the meeting due to roaster duty in Parliament but several Ministry officials and top ranking cooperators were present. Mrs Jaya Arunachalam could not attend due to her ill-health.
