The Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh has taken a big initiative to provide benefits to Primary Agricultural Credit Co-operative Societies (PACS), which provide fertilizers, seeds, pesticides, and crop loans to farmers.
For the first time, petrol pumps will be opened on the land of cooperative societies. 100 such sites have also been identified in the state, which meet the standard, now Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) will inspect the places and decide about the next process.
The UP government has taken this step to financially strengthen the cooperatives and provide facilities to the people of remote areas.
Although there are a total of 7479 cooperative societies in Uttar Pradesh, a large number of them are inactive. It is difficult to get the salary of the secretary and other staff working there.
It is said that the government pays the salary from the income of committees. As the income of committees increases, they will also become active. It is the endeavour of the government not only to limit committees to just distributing loans to the farmers but also make them the centres of economic development in rural areas.
In fact, while petrol pumps are few and far between in rural areas, the committees operate at the Nyaya Panchayat level in the districts. RK Kulshrestha, Joint Commissioner and Joint Registrar, Cooperatives, the nodal officer of the scheme, said that it is mandatory for the petrol pumps to have a land length of 40 meters and the same width.
It should be close to the city or municipality and Nagar panchayat, as well as land on the district level road, state highway, or national highway. After the information sought from all the districts, 100 places have been identified.
Kulshrestha said that now Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited will inspect them after that decision will be taken regarding the establishment of petrol pumps.