“I am not a politician anymore and thus would not touch upon controversial issues”, India’s Vice-President proved the truth of his statement throughout the speech he made at NCUI Auditorium on Monday.
He did not curse the cooperative leadership which has become a fashion among the political class, whose conduct itself is questionable many a time. Shri Naidu spoke like a true statesman rising above the narrow boundaries of party and politics.
“I know there is corruption in cooperative as is the case with corporate or other walks of life”, Shri Naidu said while focusing more on positive aspects of the cooperative movement. Most of all, he wanted the assembled cooperators to learn from the ideals of Vaikunthbhai Mehta who quit ministerial position to serve the movement at one call of Mahatma Gandhi.
In particular, the Vice-President emphasized on character, caliber, capacity and conduct of an individual in the
operation of cooperative. Putting cooperative movement a notch above the electoral politics Shri Naidu said cooperative is capable of rising above the narrow considerations of caste, community and religion.
“I was in Pune for two days attending a seminar on farm practice and cooperative where the former Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar had also come and it was he who told me in detail about the life of Vaikunthbhai Mehta”, said Shri Naidu displaying his statesmanship in giving credit to his political adversary till yesterday.
Calling agriculture as the basic culture of the country he wanted farmers to unite under the banner of cooperative. “You get a scale of economy and thus save lots of money”, he said explaining the benefits of cooperative formation among farmers.
