Remarking that District Central Cooperative Banks (DCCs) were once considered ideal institutions across Maharashtra, Union Cooperation Minister Amit Shah on Saturday rued the fact that a string of multi-crore corruption scams had tainted the cooperation sector in the State and said there was need to bring greater transparency to the sector.
Speaking in Ahmednagar district on Saturday, Mr. Shah said the Narendra Modi Government would leave no stone unturned to strengthen the cooperative movement in Maharashtra and the country.
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In a thinly veiled rebuke to the ruling tripartite ‘Maha Vikas Aghadi’ Government (of the Shiv Sena, the NCP and the Congress) and particularly the Sharad Pawar-led NCP, Mr. Shah said some State Governments were not giving bank guarantees to sugar mills whose managements were politically-linked to Opposition parties [meaning BJP in Maharashtra].
“At one time, in every district in the Maharashtra, DCCs were considered an ideal institution. Today, only three remain properly functional. How did things come to such a pass? While I don’t want to make any political statements here, how was it possible that DCCs were ruined by corruption scams of thousands of crores of rupees? The Reserve Bank certainly was not responsible for this state of affairs,” Mr. Shah said.
He was addressing a massive sugar conclave at Pravaranagar in Ahmednagar at the behest of senior BJP leader and sugar baron Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil, whose grandfather Padma Shri Vithalrao Vikhe-Patil is credited with having started the first sugar factory in the cooperative sector in India.
“Our [BJP-led Centre’s] efforts will be to ensure that sugar mills in the cooperative sector do not get privatised. I have not come here to break something but the State Government must rise above politics. However, I have seen some State Governments [targeting MVA] are not giving bank guarantees to sugar mills whose management is politically linked to Opposition parties. Why can’t Governments settle their sugar mill related issues within the respective State instead of prompting us to hold hearings in New Delhi? Will cooperatives be financed based on the political affiliations of their respective managements?” Mr. Shah asked.
Stating that State Governments needed to transcend politics, Mr. Shah warned the ruling MVA, without naming it, that he would not remain a mute spectator as Maharashtra’s cooperation movement was “as holy as Kashi” for many people.
Mr. Shah further said that the cooperation sector, which today found itself in financial distress, was in need of modernisation and had to be made more competitive.
“We shall have to get more transparency in the sector, make it more efficient in order to give jobs to and attract more professionals… only then can this sector thrive for a further 50 or 100 years,” he said.
“There is a pressing need to preserve the ideals established by cooperative giants Vitthalrao Vikhe-Patil, Vaikunth Mehta and Dr. Dhananjay Gadgil. While I agree that the cooperative sector is in distress, that is why the Centre set-up the Cooperation Ministry... Prime Minister Modi is aware that this sector is relevant even today,” he said, adding that the seeds of cooperative sector in the country were sown by Padma Shri Vikhe-Patil in Loni in Maharashtra.
The NCP has looked on with apprehension ever since the formation of a separate Cooperation Ministry under Mr. Shah by Prime Minister Modi in July this year.
Mr. Pawar has been stressing that the Central Government could not meddle in the functioning of Maharashtra’s cooperative sector as all the cooperative societies in the State were governed by the Maharashtra State Cooperative Act and that only the State, and not the Central Government, had the right to frame policies and enforce them in the sector.
The formation of the Cooperation Ministry has sparked speculation that the BJP’s real motive was to break the NCP’s hold over Maharashtra’s cooperative sector, thereby attenuating the party’s political hold in the State, particularly the sugar heartland of western Maharashtra.
