Sick and tired of meeting people in the Agriculture and Cooperation Ministry over the issue of blatant reduction of the role of NCUI and its President, a peeved NCUI leadership is planning go to court in the matter, informed sources confide.
The Union Ministry’s constant interference in the affairs of apex co-op body National Cooperative Union of India was a subject of hot debates among Governing Council members with some of them advocating a total independence from the govt, in the last Board meeting that took place in Gujarat.
The issue of seeking legal relief would be firmed up in the 27th December meeting of Governing Council scheduled in Delhi, said a source.
Cooperators wondered if they could break free from the govt as IFFCO or for that matter Kribhco has done. Some of them including Vishwanathan are impatient suggesting it should be done as soon as possible.
“I exhort you all to take a plunge; I on my own would get Rs 5 crore per annum and if all of us stretch we could survive without the govt support”, Vishwanathan was insisting on the pride of a cooperator.
Many however felt that it is easier said than done. Comparing NCUI with IFFCO or Kribhco is not logical as the former is not a commercial organization, they argued.
Meanwhile, the Ministry’s slander campaign against cooperators goes unhindered. That the ministry has reconstituted the NCCT Committee issuing an order to that effect amounts to overtly violating the MSCS Act.
Cooperators stand stunned because as if like a row of dominoes NCUI’s subsidiaries are being taken over by the Ministry. The Government constitutes the body, issues orders and monitors co-op activities making a mockery of the cooperative movement.
“We have tried convincing everyone from union ministers to smallest Babus who matter in the Ministry but they deliberately pay no heed to our case”, said a GC member who avoided being named till a final course of action is finalized.
Before NCCT, Vamnicom was taken over by the Central govt caring two hoots about cooperators. It bears recall that the reconstituted Management Committee of Vamnicom, a process carried out in April, has about eleven members with the Additional Secretary nominated as the Chairman-a position earlier held by the NCUI President.
There are about eleven members and all were nominated without consulting with the apex cooperative body which is held as the nodal agency for cooperative education and training in the country.
The 27th December meeting is going to be crucial as cooperators have to decide if NCUI wants to be just an extension of the govt or a cooperative body with autonomy all its own.
Some Cooperators want to have a Cake in hand and also eat it. Various Committees which made recommendations including Cooperative Policy 2002 and 97 Constitutional Amendment all wanted to cut down Government role to zero but does not happen. Cooperatives better do introspection and become independent of Government by snapping what ever ties exist between the two. This is definitely a financial independence also.Growth of Cooperative Movement is peoples program and not of the Government of the day.