Only after intense negotiations within the BJP, could an ace cooperator and former Minister in the Gujarat cabinet Dileepbhai Sanghani be elected Chairman of the state cooperative marketing federation of Gujarat GUJCOMASOL on Monday.
Sanghani won uncontested as Congress did not have the required number and the state BJP suppressed the dissidence among its members. Govindbhai Parmar was declared elected Vice-Chairman along with Sanghani.
The importance of this elections could be understood from the fact that as soon as the results were declared, State Chief Minister Vijay Rupani rushed to greet Sanghani and Parmar. It involved who is who of state BJP—from the CM to deputy CM to Ministers to State Party President.
Vitthal Radadiya the main challenger to Sanghani’s candidature was not lucky this time as was he in case of IFFCO. BJP MP from Porbandar Radadiya was elected Vice-Chairman of the largest farmers’ cooperative IFFCO recently in Kolkata.
In case of GUJCOMASOL, Congress also had no chance. “Congress had just three Directors and it was not in a position to throw a challenge. It was only my nomination for the Chairmanship and I won uncontested”, said a victorious Sanghani on the phone from Ahmadabad.
Gujarat Cooperative Marketing Federation Ltd (GUJCOMASOL)which had been in the news for not holding
elections for more than a decade had to elect its board of directors last month, after the Supreme Court as well as the state govt toughened their stand.
Though BJP had maximum number of Directors the backroom maneuvering as to who would be the Chairman and Vice-Chairman delayed the process of election.
It was on Sunday that the appointed committee led by Deputy CM Nitin Patel sat for deliberations to break the logjam. Internally there were two names- Dileepbhai Sanghani and Vitthal Radadiya for the top job. The committee comprising of Dy CM Nitin Patel, Minister Shankar Roy Chaudhary, BJP General Secretary K C Patel and senior party leader Kaushik Patel submitted its report to the state party President by Sunday evening.
Monday morning at around 11.30 when the elections were about to begin K C Patel read a letter from the Party President before all the BJP Directors. The message was unequivocal – Sanghani was the Party choice.
A humbled Sanghani thanked the party and the cadre for reposing faith in him. He vowed to take the already profit-making co-op body to still greater heights.
With his election as the Chairman of GUJCOMASOL , Sanghani no longer needs to be co-opted member of Nafed but he gets nominated automatically on its board, said G H Amin, who was present on the scene and who was one of the firsts to break the news beyond Gujarat.
Talking about IFFCO where GUCOSAMOL has a seat again, Sanghani said “let me see, as one of our Directors Vittalbhai Radadiya is already on the IFFCO board.”
The election was held following a Supreme Court order, after the then chairman Natubhai Patel was removed, facing charges of financial irregularities. He was also accused of deliberately delaying the election for ten years to remain in power. He later lost his position in IFFCO also where he was the Vice-Chairman.
The Gujarat Cooperative Societies (Amendment) Bill 2015 empowered the government to appoint custodians for societies where elections were not held after the completion of tenure. Around 100 such cooperative institutions had received notice from the state govt.
