Despite a hectic schedule owing to elections in many states, Union Minister Amit Shah found time to meet the Chairman of Drafting Committee of New Cooperative Policy Suresh Prabhu and NCUI Chairman Dileep Sanghani at his residence on Tuesday.
Shah, who has announced in several co-op meetings as well as in Lok Sabha that the new Co-op Policy will be ready before Diwali, is in a great hurry to fulfil his words. He called the two top leaders to get an update on the status of the final draft, according to a reliable source.
Besides Shah, there were only three persons in the meeting including Prabhu, Sanghani and Co-op Secretary Gyanesh Kumar. “It could be called an informal meeting with an aim to update the minister on the progress of the draft report”, said a source.
Chairman of the NCP Draft Committee Suresh Prabhu presented the report informally to the Minister who promised to come back after perusing it in greater detail. “The formal presentation of the Report would be done later in the presence of Committee members. The date is yet to be finalized”, he added.
“Amit Shah and his ministry are in a great hurry to accomplish as many goals as possible, as in a short span of 18 months, his ministry has launched more than fifty new co-op initiatives which touch every aspect of the co-op sector. Be it UCBs or Sugar co-ops, multi state co-ops or Kheti Banks, Nafed or NCCF, you name it, the ministry has intervened decisively in making a difference”, claimed a ministry official on condition of anonymity.
National Co-operative Policy is something the Ministry has been nursing ambition since the beginning of its existence to offer to the country and to the co-op sector. Cutting across states and boundaries, the new policy would broadly lay the foundation of a robust cooperative movement.
To achieve this goal, the Ministry has ensured that there is representation of members from all the states of the country in the Draft Committee. The new National Cooperative Policy aims at preparing the roadmap for cooperatives for the next 25 years.
“The policy will have the potential of changing the socio-economic dimension of India, substantially increasing the share of cooperatives in the total GDP. The idea behind the policy is to promote a cooperative-based economic development model backed by a legal and institutional framework”, said Dileep Sanghani talking to the Indian Cooperative.
The key recommendations include structural reforms & governance, cooperatives as vibrant economic entities, level playing field for cooperatives, sources of capital and funds, inclusion of priority sections, use of technology, upskilling and training, sustainability and implementation plan. The aim of the NCP would be to achieve the PM’s vision of Sahakar se Samriddhi”.
In one of the meetings of the Committee in the past, where Amit Shah also participated, Shah was categorical that no state should feel that its domain is being encroached through this new National Co-op Policy. The policy should be generalistic where each state can build on the basis of its specific need, Shah is quoted saying.