Union Minister of Home and Cooperation, Shri Amit Shah addressed the ‘Cooperative Beneficiaries Conference’ in Bengaluru, Karnataka today. Several dignitaries including Chief Minister of Karnataka Shri Basavaraj Bommai and Union Minister Shri Pralhad Joshi were present on the occasion.

In his address, Shri Amit Shah said that the cooperative movement in Karnataka has been progressing at a good pace for more than 100 years. He said that the first cooperative society in the whole country was established in Gadag district of Karnataka in 1905. The cooperative movement that started from there, today stands as an example in front of the world with many successful models like Amul, KRIBHCO, IFFCO, Lijjat Papad.

The Union Minister of Cooperation said that under the Nandini brand in Karnataka, about 23 lakh farmers, mostly women, are paid Rs 28 crore per day, which makes their lives more prosperous which is a huge achievement. He said that the beauty of the cooperatives is ‘Production for Masses, Production by Masses’.

Shri Amit Shah said that the Prime Minister Narendra Modi has given new momentum and long life to the cooperative movement by creating a separate ‘Ministry of Cooperation’ in the country. He said that out of 30 lakh cooperatives in the whole world, 9 lakh cooperatives are in India only. About 91 percent of India's population is linked to a cooperative in one way or another, with cooperatives covering 70 percent of the country's farmers through PACS. He said that there are 33 state level cooperative banks, 363 district level cooperative banks and 63,000 PACS in the country. Shri Shah said that today 19 percent of our agriculture finance is done through cooperative societies. 35 percent fertilizer distribution, 30 percent fertilizer production, 40 percent sugar production, 13 percent procurement of wheat and 20 percent of paddy procurement is done by cooperatives only.

The country's first Minister of Cooperation said that since the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi came in the country many farmer-centric schemes has been made and accelerated further. He said that after the formation of the Ministry of Cooperation, many decisions were taken, such as to bring transparency in cooperatives, computerization of 63,000 PACS across the country has been done at a cost of Rs. 2,500 crores. Apart from this, one cooperative society will be formed in every panchayat of the country, which will be multi-purpose and NABARD, NDDB and the Ministry of Cooperation have prepared an action plan to form 2 lakh new such cooperative societies in three years. Shri Shah said that after this scheme, the coverage of cooperatives in the country, turnover and the number of its beneficiaries will increase more than three times.

Shri Amit Shah said that on the basis of Amul Model, a multistate cooperative Society is being established for the sale of organic products across the world, so that the profit goes directly to the farmers. A multistate cooperative society is also being formed for seed production and breed promotion of Indian seeds. He said that there is also a plan to set up a Cooperative University in the country, to create a national database of all cooperatives across the country work has started and formulation of a new cooperative policy has also begun. Shri Shah said that we are going to expand the role of NCDC along with NABARD so that cooperative societies can get finance in a better way. For conducting of transparent Elections a model act has also been prepared and sent to all the states. To bring transparency and fix accountability in the Multi-State Co-operative Societies Act, a bill has come which has been sent to the Standing Committee. He said that earlier more tax was being collected from the cooperative societies than the companies, but in the last budget Prime Minister Narendra Modi has brought the cooperatives at par with the companies by reducing the surcharge of the cooperative society from 12% to 7% by and reducing the alternative tax from 18% to 15%. Shri Shah said that the housing loan limit of Urban Cooperative Bank has been increased by 3 times by RBI, loan limit on commercial property has also been increased and door step banking has also been allowed.

The Union Home and Cooperation Minister said that it is not only the responsibility of Karnataka to strengthen the cooperative movement of Karnataka, some ideals have to be established so that the states across the country get the message and from here all the states can adopt the best practices and create a new model of cooperation in their respective states. He said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's decision to form the Ministry of Cooperation to speed up the cooperative movement will strengthen the efforts to fill the gaps in the cooperative movement across the country so that the cooperative movement progress uniformly across the country.

**************

NW / RK / AY/ AS