The election to the Board of Directors of the National Federation of State Cooperative Banks (NAFSCOB), the apex body representing State Cooperative Banks, has taken an unopposed turn, with all 21 candidates set to enter the Board for the 2026–2031 term.
The development follows the withdrawal of nomination by Kedar Nath Gupta, the nominee of Chhattisgarh State Cooperative Bank. His withdrawal brought the number of candidates down from 22 to 21, exactly matching the available Board seats.
The final list of contesting candidates, published by the Returning Officer on October 30, confirms the names of all 21 candidates. The outcome is now subject to the approval of the Cooperative Election Authority under the Ministry of Cooperation, following which the result will be formally announced. The scheduled polling on November 5 is therefore unlikely to take place.
This election has also brought several prominent faces into the NAFSCOB Board. Among them are Vidyadhar V Anaskar, Administrator of Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank; T Prasad Rao Dora, President of Odisha State Cooperative Bank; Ganni Veeranjaneyulu, Chairman of Andhra Pradesh State Cooperative Bank; Bibha Singh, Chairperson of Jharkhand State Cooperative Bank; and others.
The other candidates in the final list include Nand Kishore Singh from Andaman & Nicobar, Biswajit Phukan from Assam, Dr. Bijender Singh from Delhi, Pandurang N Kurtikar from Goa, Ajaybhai H Patel from Gujarat, Davender Singh Shyam from Himachal Pradesh and Bharat Bhushan Juyal from Haryana.
The remaining members are K N Rajanna from Karnataka, Mohan Master from Kerala, Mahendra Singh Yadav from Madhya Pradesh, Waibha K Kyndiah from Meghalaya, Lalnunsanga from Mizoram, Jagdev Singh from Punjab, Dr. Samit Sharma, IAS, from Rajasthan, Jitendra Bahadur Singh from Uttar Pradesh, Pradeep Mehrotra from Uttarakhand and Aveek Bhattacharya from West Bengal.
With the Board election process moving towards an unopposed conclusion, attention will now shift to the election of NAFSCOB’s office bearers, scheduled for November 17, 2026.
