The declining GDP and depressing economic indicators have taken a toll on the cooperative movement of India. After a long and arduous bargain with the government, National Cooperative Union of India (NCUI) did get some fund but not enough to make it worry-free.
The Ministry letter reaching the NCUI lays emphasis on resource-generation on the part of the apex cooperative organization. It exhorts the NCUI to stand on its feet and generate its own fund.
Talking to Indian Cooperative, the NCUI Chief Executive Dr Dinesh said “I am leaving for Hyderabad soon to meet our ICMs and deliberate on the possibilities of generating fund”.
Dr Dinesh informed that he would be visiting most of the areas where the ICMs are located and field projects are running to see how we could be self-reliant.
When Indian Cooperative contacted President of the NCUI Dr Chandra Pal Singh Yadav he said we are meeting Union Minister Sharad Pawar on Friday to impress on him the necessity of the governmental support for the NCUI at this stage.
The government asks us to use corpus fund. We got a study conducted by IRMA, the prestigious body of Rural Management and it concluded we should not touch the corpus fund at this stage.
Some years ago a corpus fund of Rs 100 crore was created that included contributions from both the government and the NCUI. The amount has grown to Rs 330 crore. The IRMA Study revealed that it is safe to use this corpus fund once the amount gets as high as Rs 500 crore, said Chandra Pal.
“We request the government either to support us till the amount grows to Rs 500 crore or donate us another Rs 150 crore to take this amount to a magical figure of Rs 500 crore. We would not bother the government after that”, President asserted.
Agriculture Ministry, in its letter on fund release says that the NCUI has to support NCCT fully.
The ministry conceded only 50 percent of the Field Projects’ expenditure from its coffer too.
The government has directed the NCUI to make up the remaining amount partly from the corpus fund and partly from the resources the NCUI could generate itself.
“The amount we pay to those involved in the projects is so measly that keeping them motivated is a big challenge for us’, said Dr Dinesh.
Earlier, President of the NCUI gave up administrative and financial powers to meet the ministry’s pre-condition for releasing the fund.